by K. C. Cross
Contents
DAMAGED GODS
DESCRIPTION
CHAPTER ONE - PIE
CHAPTER TWO - PIE
CHAPTER THREE - PELL
CHAPTER FOUR - PIE
CHAPTER FIVE - PELL
CHAPTER SIX - PIE
CHAPTER SEVEN - PELL
CHAPTER EIGHT - PIE
CHAPTER NINE - PELL
CHAPTER TEN - PIE
CHAPTER ELEVEN - PELL
CHAPTER TWELVE - PIE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN - PELL
CHAPTER FOURTEEN - PIE
CHAPTER FIFTEEN - PELL
CHAPTER SIXTEEN - PIE
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN - PELL
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN - PIE
CHAPTER NINETEEN - PELL
CHAPTER TWENTY - PIE
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE - PELL
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO - PIE
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE - PELL
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR - PIE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE - PELL
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX - PIE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN - PELL
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT - PIE
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE - PELL
CHAPTER THIRTY - PIE
CHAPTER THIRTY ONE - PELL
CHAPTER THIRTY - TWO - PIE
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE - PELL
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR - PIE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE - PELL
EPILOGUE - PIE
END OF BOOK SHIT
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
DAMAGED GODS
Edited by RJ Locksley
Cover Design by JA Huss
Copyright © 2021 by JA Huss
All rights reserved.
ISBN-978-1-950232-70-3
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
DESCRIPTION
A not-so-ordinary girl named Pie stumbles in to a monster’s 2000-year-old curse only to realize she is exactly where she belongs.
When I answered an ad for a caretaker at Saint Mark’s Sanctuary I thought I’d be dusting chandeliers and polishing floors. I didn’t expect to be tricked into a curse, going in debt to a monster, and being forced to take a self-paced “Let’s Learn Magic” course so I can fix a two-thousand-year-old problem.
And that monster?
Not your ordinary, everyday beast.
He has hooves, and horns, and fur on his legs.
But ya know where he doesn’t have fur?
Yep. There.
Which is fine.
Except he doesn’t wear pants.
Nothing at Saint Mark’s is exactly what it seems.
The entire inside is magic, the hallways upstairs are nothing but parties from the past, and the super-hot guy who lives in the dungeon?
Yeah.
Not human.
My name is Pie and all I want is to be a normal girl with an average life.
I refuse to get stuck in this curse.
I refuse to learn magic to break it.
And there is no way in hell I will fall in love with a monster.
Famous.
Last.
Words.
CHAPTER ONE - PIE
The smudgy filth on the gas station mirror isn’t enough to hide the girl looking back.
Someone is pounding on the restroom door, but I only half hear it because I’m staring intently at myself, wondering how it got this bad.
I have never been a hundred percent on board with the girl I am, but I’ve come to accept her.
Until today.
Today… today I am questioning everything.
Especially my outfit.
“What the hell was I thinking last night?” I mutter this to the girl in the mirror, but it’s Pia who answers me.
“Stop it.” Her tiny voice is a bit muffled because she’s hiding in my flannel pocket, but it’s clear enough to hear her judgment. She hates it when I start with the self-loathing.
“It’s ten AM in the morning, Pia. I woke up in a cave at Mount Aloysius College thirty minutes ago. An angry nun hit me with a stick and called me a Babylonian whore.” That might not be right. I was pretty out of it when I woke up in that cave place. It might’ve been Roman whore. “Then,” I continue, “I got a ticket for illegally parking at the chapel last night and I just did the walk of shame through a rest-stop gas station in my Halloween costume.”
This outfit seemed like a really good idea yesterday afternoon. I was driving through rural PA and saw the kids from the college celebrating when I was at a red light in their sleepy little town. One thing led to another, blah, blah, blah… and then I was doing Jell-O shots with the cool kids dressed like this.
Is there any other way to attend a Halloween party at the private Catholic college without being a naughty schoolgirl? Am I right? I’m totally right.
Pia pokes her head out of my pocket, just enough so I can see her crown of red feathers. Her little beady eyes peer up at me as she speaks. “That wasn’t a cave. It was the Grotto Our Lady of Lourdes. Miracles happened there.”
“What language are you speaking?”
“A grotto is a cave with water and the miracles happened in Lourdes.”
“Well, trust me. There are no miracles happening in this part of PA. It’s nothing but hills and the people who live in them.”
I screw up my face in the mirror and try to force the outfit from my mind. It made so much sense yesterday. The red and black tartan schoolgirl skirt—in micro-mini version—the ripped, black fishnet stockings, and the red, strapless leather bustier. The flannel came later. After I pulled my head out of my ass and escaped from Sister Judge-y. Why didn’t I bring clothes into the bathroom with me? I have trash bags full of them in the back of my Jeep. Then I could’ve avoided the walk of shame out of here.
“The combat boots really pull it together,” Pia offers.
I appreciate her optimism. She’s always ready with a compliment to boost me back up when I’m flailing.
More pounding on the door.
“Why must people pound on doors!” I say it loud enough so the asshole on the other side gets the hint. Then I sigh and add, to Pia, “I have a raging hangover.”
“I warned you about that last round of Jell-O shots.”
I point at her in the mirror. “That you did.” I wet a paper towel and pat down my face.
Pia’s warm, sparrow body squirms inside my flannel pocket, trying to climb out. She is under strict orders not to speak to me in public, but it’s OK right now, since we’re in the bathroom. “Blaming yourself won’t change anything.” She manages to claw her way up onto my shoulder and even though she can’t weigh any more than a few ounces, her presence is much bigger than her size. I find this comforting.
Which is both sad and… well, just sad.
Because she’s not real.
No one can see her or hear her except me. And even though I spent the better part of my childhood insisting she was real, that was a losing battle and always ended up in the same place. Me being called crazy and confined to institutions.
So. Fine. I’ve accepted it.
She is just my imagination.
She is my imaginary friend.
My personal hallucination.
I snort at my smudgy face in the mirror as the person outside continues to pound on the door.
“For fuck’s sake!” I turn towards the pounding and yell back. “What part of ‘occupied’ don’t you understand?”
I throw the door open and come face to face with a small girl.
Maybe eight. She is pinching her legs together and squirming, like she’s about to pee herself, and if I didn’t already feel bad enough, now I feel worse.
Karma, man. It fucking hates me.
“I’m so sorry.” I step out of the way and wave a hand at the thoroughly disgusting gas station restroom. “It’s all yours.”
I linger in the hallway crowded with unopened boxes and a bucket of filthy water with a mop sticking out, because this place is super busy and I don’t want to repeat my walk of shame just yet. This costume is a losing battle. I’m either a petulant, overgrown teenager who just recently became obsessed with the movie The Craft, or… this is my Halloween costume and I didn’t go home last night.
Not that I have a home. I don’t. I was on my way to Ohio to crash with a former foster sister when I got caught up in the whole ‘spirit of Halloween party’ thing.
Note to self. Never show your face at Mount Aloysius College again.
The most ironic thing about this costume—these are my actual clothes. I pulled them right out of those trash bags in the back of my Jeep.
I lean against the dirty wall and casually browse the bulletin board across the aisle. There are lot of business cards pinned to it, plus a few advertisements for kittens, a poster for a missing dog from last year, and a help-wanted flyer.
I pull the flyer down and study the picture. It’s a sketch of an old church-like building somewhere in a town called Sanctuary, which I’ve never heard of, but no one’s heard of anything in this part of PA. It’s all very rural.
“What’s it say?” Pia asks.
I always found it interesting that Pia can’t read. I mean, she can talk. Why wouldn’t I give her reading capabilities?
“It’s a help-wanted ad. For a live-in caretaker at some place called Saint Mark’s Sanctuary.”
A guy about my age is walking out of the men’s room and shoots me a funny look, wondering who I’m talking to. I lift my hair away from my ear and point to the bud.
He looks away, satisfied that I’m not nuts, just being rude by having a phone conversation in public.
I learned that trick early. I mean, as soon as they came out with Bluetooth, I was all over that shit. The perfect excuse if one is perpetually talking to her imaginary friend.
Pia doesn’t offer up an opinion on the job, so I read the rest of the flyer to myself. It could be promising. The building looks nice, but why use a sketch instead of a photograph?
It’s a red flag.
The building looks super old and it’s probably infested with rats or something. And there’s no picture of what the live-in situation really entails. Is it a room in this institution? Because I might rather be homeless than live in another institution. I’ve had enough of those for ten lifetimes.
It doesn’t say anything about a salary, either. In fact, it says very little. A couple of sentences extolling the virtues of the grounds and the history of the building, most of which has to be a lie because it says the main building was erected in 1685 and as far as I know, this part of PA was nothing but forest in 1685.
Pia sighs on my shoulder. She is me, after all. And I’m feeling particularly weary right now.
“Maybe I should apply?” I say. “It can’t hurt.”
The truth is, I’m tired of living in my car. And I already know that this trip to Toledo to stay with Jacqueline is gonna be a disaster. We haven’t seen each other in six years. The last time we talked she told me she had four kids and was working three jobs. If she actually lets me stay more than one night, I’ll probably end up her babysitter.
And it’s not like I would mind helping her out, especially if she let me stay, but…
But I had grand plans once.
Caretaker.
It’s better than babysitter. No kids.
I don’t know what a caretaker does, but I imagine cleaning and stuff like that. They probably have a whole crew of cleaners. I could meet new people, learn my way around a new town, and start a whole new life. And besides, I wouldn’t have to stay there if the room isn’t nice. I could rent a little house in the woods. Rent is super cheap in this part of PA. Back in Philly, where I come from, people my age can’t afford to live on their own anymore. It’s all about how many roommates you can get along with while paying seven hundred dollars a month for a room the size of a closet.
Pia climbs back down my shirt and disappears into my front pocket, her tiny heartbeat galloping against my chest.
And that’s it, I guess.
I do my walk of shame with my head high (and my sunglasses on), fill up my tank, get back into my Jeep, and then go south towards the town called Sanctuary.
The sun is setting by the time I drive along the massive brick wall until I find an equally huge iron gate in front of the building sketched out in the flyer. There is no parking lot, just a small pull-in space in front.
I put the Jeep in park and peer up at the old brick building. It’s not crumbling. In fact, it looks to be well cared for. The grounds are neat, not a single leaf on the grass, which is still quite green, even though it’s November first.
“Is it closed?” I’m not really asking Pia. Just trying to sort out how I get inside the sanctuary.
I get out of the Jeep and walk up to the gate. It’s a very nice gate. Something custom and old. Very old. Maybe even as old as this building claims to be because it’s got a patina. Mostly it’s black with some rust spots, but there are words engraved over the arch of the top and those are aged-copper green. A horn, a hoof, an eye, a bone. A man, a girl, a place of stone. A tick of time, a last mistake, keep them safe behind the gate. These words are separated by a relief image between ‘a bone’ and ‘a man’. It’s a… symbol. Some kind of simple mark. I search my brain for the word I’m looking for. Not a logo. Not a crest. More like a… sigil.
Yeah. I think. I’m not really sure what a sigil is, but that word pops into my head and it feels right so I go with it.
I peek through the wrought-iron bars. There is no one on the grounds in front. There is no intercom to buzz and ask for guidance, but there is a skinny walking gate on one side, and when I try the old iron handle, it turns with a squeak. “It’s not locked,” I say. “Maybe we should just walk up and knock on the door?”
“We should leave,” Pia says, flying over to land on my shoulder. “I don’t like this place, Pie.”
“Well, I do.” I’m annoyed with her and it comes out in my tone. Because Pia is the whole reason why my life is crap and people think I’m crazy.
I am the girl with the imaginary friend.
I am the girl who talks to herself.
I am the girl who hallucinates.
And I have always stuck up for her, insisting that she is real. So can she just be supportive? Please? Right?
Pia is why my mother left me in foster care when I was nine. I was dragged to dozens of free, Medicaid-approved psychiatrists when I refused to say that Pia was fake. They diagnosed me with schizophrenia when I was six. Put me on all kinds of drugs. Made me go to therapy and finally, when I was about twelve, I figured out how to play their stupid game.
Lie. Just lie.
So I became a liar.
And it worked.
They stopped the drugs, they stopped the therapy, and they stopped calling me crazy.
But that was a lie too, because I don’t care what anyone says. Pia is real.
She has to be real. Otherwise I really am crazy.
“I want to check it out,” I tell her. “And if you wanna stay here, then stay. In fact, I think you should stay here. The last thing I need is you distracting me and blowing this opportunity. Or… killing my hope. Because right now, this place has potential. It’s got no chance of being a home, but I could do worse when it comes to a temporary way station to regroup and rest after running away from my worthless crap of a life back in Philly. It’s got to be better than Jacqueline’s couch. She doesn’t even know I’m coming yet, by the way. So. Yeah. I’m checking this place out.”
Pia doesn’t respond. Just snuggles back into my pocket.
And that’s that. I’m doing this.
So I suck in a deep breath and walk through the gate.
There is a little bit of fog rolling in as the sun begins to dip behind the tall trees, and I shiver. This is when I once again take notice of what I’m wearing.
I should’ve changed, at least. No one is gonna hire me looking like this. So I turn, and in that moment, I’m convinced this is a terrible idea. I don’t know what I was thinking, coming here looking like a Halloween leftover. No one wants to be a stupid caretaker anyway. And I’m just about to push that walking gate open and leave when a man calls out.
“Hello!”
I whirl around. “Hello?” I don’t see anyone.
“Up here.”
I look up to the second floor of the main building and see a young man, about my age, wearing—well, from my vantage point, he’s not wearing much at all, actually. I can’t see if he has pants on—I’m going to assume he does—because the brick balcony is in the way. But he definitely has no shirt on. Because I can see every freaking muscle in his upper body.
I dip my sunglasses down so I can see him better. “Well. Hello back.”
He stares down at me for a few moments, smiling.
And wow. That’s a nice smile. Please, please, please, God. You owe me. Please make this man my boss. I cross my fingers behind my back to give that prayer a little extra.
“Are you here for the job?”
“Um.” I look down at my clothes and just say, Fuck it. I’m inappropriate at all times. If these people are going to hire me, might as well get that out of the way up front. So I look back up at him and nod. “Yep. I’m here for the caretaker job.”
He clasps his hands in front of his chest like he’s praying, awkwardly pauses, then finally says, “That’s. Amazing.”
Just like that. Two sentences. Like it truly is a miracle.
And I agree. He’s amazing. So I let out a breath, smile at him, and say, “Yes. And…” I look over at the massive front door to the… not church, but sanctuary. “Should I meet you inside?”