Once Upon a Happy Ending: An Anthology of Reimagined Fairy Tales
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Once Upon a Happy Ending
An Anthology of Reimagined Fairy Tales
16 Incredible Authors
Contents
About the Stories
By Ella Summers
Twelve Dancing Angels
By Brittany Fichter
The Goose Girl
By K.M. Shea
The Princess Who Chased Sheep
By Shari L. Tapscott
Chains of Gold
By Casey Lane
Rapunzel's Beauty
By Jamie Campbell
Hansel and Gretel: Devil Children
By RaShelle Workman
Ellora’s Tail
by Rebecca Hamilton and Conner Kressley
The Woods
By Cameron Jace
A Fistful of Stars
By May Sage
That Damn Pea
By T. Rae Mitchell
Beastly Beauty
By Aya Ling
Sleeping Cyborg
By A. W. Exley
Vincent, the Tailor
By Melanie Cellier
The Pastry Chef’s Apprentice
by Rachel Morgan
Through the Mirror
Once Upon a Happy Ending: An Anthology of Reimagined Fairy Tales © copyright 2016 by Casey Lane and Bryan Cohen
Individual stories copyrighted by their respective authors.
All rights reserved under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead organizations, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Warning: the unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.
Twelve Dancing Angels by Ella Summers
Based on The Twelve Dancing Princesses. Every night in Nyx’s dreams, she travels to a beautiful, hellish realm where she is forced to fight for her life against vampires, witches, and other supernaturals. She soon realizes some nightmares are real—and that there is nothing more dangerous than her forgotten past.
The Goose Girl by Brittany Fichter
Based on The Goose Girl. When a princess is cursed to trade places with her handmaiden, she has only days to break the curse before her beloved is wed to another…
The Princess Who Chased Sheep by KM Shea
Based on The Dirty Shepherdess. Clever Colette is exiled from the royal palace for a year after arguing with her father, the king. She disguises herself and works as a shepherdess until a sly young lord stumbles upon her. Will her guise fool him, or does he see her for who she really is?
Chains of Gold by Shari L. Tapscott
Based on Rumplestilzchen. In a dark tower high above the Black Forest, promises are made, straw becomes gold, and a young woman's life is saved. But magic always comes with a price...
Rapunzel’s Beauty by Casey Lane
Based on Rapunzel. Two warriors hear of a beautiful woman trapped at the top of a tower. When they attempt to rescue her, they realize the truth is much more terrifying than the legend…
Hansel and Gretel Devil Children by Jamie Campbell
Based on Hansel and Gretel. Hansel and Gretel are not the children you know them to be. While acting sweet and innocent, their stepmother can see right through their act. In a bid to save her own life, she must teach the children a lesson that will stay with them forever.
Ellora’s Tail by RaShelle Workman
Based on The Little Mermaid.
One lives on land.
The other dwells under the sea.
An unexpected encounter on a moonlit night.
Changes their lives for eternity.
A fluke accident sends Ellora over the edge of her friend’s boat. Instead of drowning, she discovers a family secret.
The Woods by Rebecca Hamilton & Conner Kressley
Based on Little Red Riding Hood. When Lila is chosen as a sacrifice for the beast in the forest, she finally learns the truth the Elders were never willing to share…
A Fistful of Stars by Cameron Jace
Based on The Wizard of Oz. Door, short for Dorothy, is a ruthless outlaw with an unquenched lust for revenge in the 1800s. She’ll do anything to find the Emerald City — no matter what the price…
That Damn Pea by May Sage
Based on The Princess and the Pea. After four disastrous relationships, The King of Atela lets his terrifying fairy godmother help him find a decent woman. He never expected a weary single mother working at a takeout joint…
Beastly Beauty by T. Rae Mitchell
Based on Beauty and the Beast. What if the beauty was the beast? Would he still love her?
Sleeping Cyborg by Aya Ling
Based on Sleeping Beauty. Once upon a time on Planet Neru, Sleeping Beauty is a cyborg whose mechanical hands were deliberately implanted to protect her from a powerful curse.
Vincent by AW Exley
Based on The Brave Little Tailor. The flu pandemic of 1918 took millions of souls within a few short weeks. Except it wasn't flu. And the dead weren’t gone for long…
The Pastry Chef’s Apprentice by Melanie Cellier
Based on Cinderella. Hanna, an apprentice in the royal kitchens, is used to being ignored, mistreated and overlooked. But when she finds out her best friend is in danger she'll brave a royal ball to save him and fight for her own happily ever after.
Through the Mirror by Rachel Morgan
Based on Snow White. After Bianca's father dies, leaving her alone with her cruel step-mother, Bianca sneaks into the forbidden room that contains only one item: a mysterious mirror...
Twelve Dancing Angels
A Legion of Angels story
By Ella Summers
Chapter 1
I stood in front of the coffee machine, waiting for it to produce my third cup of concentrated caffeine since lunch. I hadn’t been sleeping well for the last week. Oh, I fell asleep just fine. In fact, I could hardly fight the wave of exhaustion crashing against me right now at four-thirty in the afternoon. The problem wasn’t falling asleep; it was what happened after that. Every night in my dreams, I had to fight for my life. And the thing was, I wasn’t even sure they were only dreams.
I tapped my toe in time to my impatient pulse, the sharp clicks of dress shoes against ceramic tiles echoing in the open room, snapping over the shuffling footsteps of the two men in dark police uniforms coming my way. They were carrying what looked like a portable cannon between them. It must have been the new anti-vampire artillery the Portland Police Department had ordered. From the men’s red, crinkled faces, the cannon was as heavy as it looked. As they passed by me, Ben, the man carrying the back half, shot me a grin. I smiled back, and he stumbled, losing his grip. My hands flashed out—quickly, instinctively—and I caught his end of the cannon.
“Uh, thanks, Nyx,” said Ben, his cheeks flushed.
His gaze traced the slim contours of my arms. I didn’t l
ook very strong, but I could lift more than anyone at the station. It was a mystery. I didn’t lift weights. I’d tried running once, but it just freaked me out. I ran too fast. It wasn’t natural. It wasn’t human. I had no idea where my strength and speed came from. In fact, I didn’t even know who I’d been before waking up naked in a dark alley in Portland five years ago. Considering that I’d been covered from head to toe in blood, I was thinking I didn’t even want to know.
Whatever had happened to me before, this was my life now. Once I’d washed off the blood in the river, I’d discovered a small tattoo on my hip: a few decorative swirls with the word ‘Nyx’ in the middle. And that’s the name I’d given the pair of police officers who’d found me walking naked and dazed along the riverside.
These two men in front of me now hadn’t been on the police force back then, so they didn’t know me for my midnight nudity. They just knew me for my freakish strength. I was also good at fixing things. Whenever something broke at the station, they called me in to fix it. Maybe I’d been a mechanic in my former life.
“We really have to get this cannon mounted on the roof,” Mac, the other police officer, told me.
“Oh, of course,” I said quickly, passing the load back to Ben. How long had I been standing there stupidly, holding that thing?
The two police officers carried the cannon toward the elevator, and I carried my coffee back to my desk. Valerie, one of the other secretaries who worked this shift, gave me a sly smile as I sat down.
“What?” I asked, smoothing down the wrinkles in my skirt.
Her smile widened. “Ben is sweet on you.”
Valerie was an enthusiastic gossip and an incorrigible matchmaker, but she had a good heart. She just wanted to make people happy.
“He’s too young,” I told her, sipping from my coffee.
“You look pretty young yourself, Nyx. I swear you haven’t aged a day in five years. Do you use Age of Innocence?”
Age of Innocence was the latest anti-aging cream to hit the market. It was made by witches, and unlike most of the competing products, it apparently actually worked. If you could afford it. The stuff cost over a hundred dollars for a tiny bottle.
“No, I don’t use Age of Innocence,” I told her.
Valerie was already moving on to my next potential match. “How about Liam?” she asked, her eyes flickering to the detective coaxing the coffee machine back awake.
“Too old.”
“And Will?” she asked as a police officer with the body of a professional weightlifter passed by our desks.
We’d played this game so many times before, but I replied anyway, “Too married.”
“How about him?”
I followed her gaze to the man who’d just walked into the room. Well, maybe walked was the wrong word. He really was a beast of a man. He was dressed in a pair of jeans and a tank top that showed off muscular arms completely covered in tattoos—tattoos that made the decorative swirls on my hip look like tiny drops of ink. He stood like a boulder between the two police officers who were having a hard time pulling him along with them.
“Hey, there,” he said, stopping to thump his handcuffed hands down on my desk. His dark eyes met mine, and no matter how much the police officers tugged at him, he didn’t budge. “Want to go have a drink with me, Snow White?”
He wasn’t the first person who’d called me that. He wasn’t even the hundredth. Between my long black hair and my pale skin, I could see why people had nicknamed me after that fairytale princess.
“That depends,” I told him. “Are you Prince Charming?”
Amusement flashed in his eyes. “I could be for you.” He staggered to the side as one of the police officers tasered him. “Think about it, princess,” he called out as they dragged him off.
Chuckling, I turned in my chair—and met Valerie’s wide smirk.
“Too delinquent,” I told her.
She sighed. “And what about Nate?” she asked, referring to the newest member of the police force.
“Too scrawny. I could bench press him with my pinkie.”
“Well, aren’t you a regular Goldilocks. So picky!” Her eyes honed in on another police officer across the room. “How about August? He’s not too young or too old or too married or too delinquent or too scrawny. He’s just right. In all the right places.” She wiggled her eyebrows.
I looked him up and down. “Too paranormal,” I declared.
“You’re kidding me.”
“No, I’m not,” I told her. “He’s a werewolf.”
“How do you know? Are you a telepath or something?”
“No, but one of our colleagues is.”
Her name was Melanie, and she was another of the station’s secretaries. I wasn’t about to rat her out, though. There was only one choice in life for telepaths: to enter the gods’ service. If I told people about her, we’d never see her again.
Valerie’s jaw dropped. “Don’t tell me we have a fairy too.”
“No. But there is a vampire among us.”
She shook her head. “I don’t think I want to know.”
I grinned at her. “You’re right. You don’t want to know. And it’s not who you think.”
“Kipling.”
“No, he’s a witch.”
She blinked in surprise. “Is there anyone normal in this office?”
“Oh, most everyone here is completely human.” Fortunately.
“But Kipling? He’s a witch? No way. I even went out with him a few times.”
“What happened?”
“Nothing. Which was the problem. We just didn’t click. He’s…eccentric.” The smile returned to her face. “Hey, maybe you should go out with him. You’re eccentric too.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“I didn’t mean that in a bad way, Nyx,” she added hastily. “Of course he’s a bit different if he’s a witch. And you’re, uh, different too. Maybe you two have something in common.”
“I want to stay away from supernaturals.”
The first memory I had was from five years ago. As I’d blinked into consciousness, the lingering images of two supernaturals flashed through my head. The memory was fuzzy, but I didn’t need a play-by-play to get the gist of it. The two men had attacked me. Brutalized me. And then they’d left me for dead. I didn’t even know what kind of supernaturals they were—just that they were strong, fast, and cruel. I did know that I didn’t want to have anything to do with the paranormal world. Supernaturals were the reason I had only one memory of my life before waking up in that dark alley: the memory of those men beating me bloody. I shivered, trying to free my mind of those paralyzing images born of fear and helplessness.
Some of my pain must have shown on my face because Valerie wrapped her arm around me. “Don’t worry, honey. We’ll find you a nice, normal guy.”
The problem was I wasn’t normal. Not even a bit. And my supernatural past was about to rear its ugly head.
Chapter 2
After work, I walked home to my one-room apartment. It was old and small and kind of drafty, but you couldn’t beat the view. I took a moment to stand at the window and enjoy it as I pet my cat Twilight. Millions of tiny sparkles danced on the river’s surface—scattered reflections of the moon, the city lights, and the huge glowing green wall just outside the city limits. Beyond that wall of stone and magic lay the Plains of Monsters.
Two hundred years ago, a war had raged on Earth, a war between gods and demons. The gods had won and driven the demons back into hell, but the monsters remained. Unable to destroy the beasts who’d overrun half of the planet, the gods had built vast walls between civilization and the wild lands. Most of the towns along the wall—a border area called the Frontier—were small and run-down, but a few cities had endured. Portland was one of them. As far as Frontier towns went, we had it good. We had none of the cowboy justice or the old-fashioned steam technology that characterized other border towns. Our city was pleasant, orderly, and completely powered by Magitech,
the magic steam that made everything run, including lovely little amenities like heating and kitchen appliances. Thank goodness for that.
Winter had hit suddenly today. Shivering in my thin blouse and skirt, I headed for the stove to heat up my luxurious dinner of chicken noodle soup. A quick glance outside the kitchen window told me it had begun to snow. As Twilight purred and rubbed against my legs, I watched fat snowflakes fall like angel feathers from the sky. It was so beautiful, so hypnotic. So cold. Frost crackled across the inside of the windowpane. I looked down to find my own hand pressed to the glass, a web of ice spreading out from my palm. I withdrew my hand quickly and closed my eyes, counting back slowly from ten. When I opened my eyes again, the frost was gone. Maybe I was imagining things. Or maybe I was just going crazy.
The soup ladle was rocking in my trembling hand. I set it down on the counter before I lost my grip and dropped it on the cat.
“What am I?” I asked her.
A loud purr rumbled in her chest, like a car engine.
“I’m as strong as a vampire or a shifter. I can cast spells like an elemental. And I can fix the Magitech machines at the office like only a witch can. Whatever I am, it isn’t human.”
Twilight meowed, as though she wholeheartedly approved of my non-human status. Or maybe she was just impatient for dinner. I filled two bowls with soup, then carried them over to the coffee table. I’d put extra chicken in Twilight’s bowl just the way she liked it. The moment I set down her dinner, she pounced on it, her pink tongue lapping up the soup with ravenous hunger.