Not My Fantasy Read online

  Not My Fantasy

  Sam Hall

  Contents

  Description

  Dedication

  Author Note

  Trigger Warnings

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Epilogue

  Aussie Lingo Glossary

  About the Author

  Acknowledgments

  Description

  When Ash and her sister inherited their grandmother’s magic shop, they figured they’d be selling crystals and smudge sticks to ageing hippies. Instead, they find themselves dealing with a failing business and a revolving door of tinsel-haired elves and fairy-tale princes.

  And that’s not even the weird part.

  Cursed in some sort of freakish loop, Ash wakes up every morning next to her sister’s latest book boyfriend, or fangirl crush. Frazzled by her unwanted nocturnal visitors, Ash fights for the focus needed to save the shop from bankruptcy. Then, in walks Gabe. Looking like a biker wet dream, Ash immediately dismisses him as another of her sister’s lusty manifestations. But this hottie is real and may hold the key to saving their business.

  Things appear to be looking up, until an inter-dimensional gateway is discovered in the store that allows characters from every multiverse imaginable to cross over. Can the sisters learn how to control the portal before it destroys the line between fact and fiction?

  If you love paranormal romance and urban fantasy tropes, but want to have a bit of fun with them sometimes, this is your book. If you watched a lot of bad 80s fantasy with papier-mâché props, noticed all romance guys have massive wangs or checked the back of a wardrobe to see if there was a portal to another realm, this is your book. If you like snarky, sex-positive female characters, this is your book. If you still have a total soft spot for talking animals and really wish you could have one of your own, this is your book.

  Author note: This book operates as a standalone, but will form part of a series featuring other characters and as a result, will contain some unresolved plot lines. Romance is steamy and explicit sex scenes are a feature, so definitely 18+. Australian English has been used, so if sweary dialogue is going to put you off, do not read this.

  Not My Fantasy

  Not My Fantasy © Sam Hall 2019

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except for in the case of brief quotations for the use in critical articles or reviews.

  Cover art and design © Nichole Witholder

  The characters and events depicted in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Created with Vellum

  Dedication

  This book is dedicated to

  Matt

  Loving dad, patient alpha reader and best partner a girl could ask for

  and to

  Jack

  You read my baby stories when I was still in primary school and pronounced them good. Apparently this is all it takes to keep me going!

  Author Note

  This book is written in Australian English, which is a weird lovechild of British and American English. We tend to spell things the way the Brits do (expect a lot more u’s), yet also use American slang and swear more than both combined. I’ve included a list of what I think are Australianisms used in the book at the back in a glossary.

  While many people have gone over this book, trying to find all the typos and other mistakes, they just keep on popping up like bloody rabbits. If you spot one, don’t report it to Amazon, drop me an email at the below address so I can fix the issue.

  [email protected]

  Trigger Warnings

  This book deals at times with violence against women, including sexual violence. While a lot of the book is cute and fluffy, it takes a turn towards the end that gets intense. The main character does get sexually assaulted, but not raped. There are some fairly intense descriptions of violence against female monsters in one scene as well.

  If it matters to you, there is a whole lot of butt-kicking going on after, especially to those the perpetrate violence.

  Violence in the book is used to demonstrate the casual misogyny that privilege can engender, not just for titillation or to artificially create drama. The intention was to do so showing female agency, admittedly in an idealised situation. If you have concerns about this, please email me on:

  [email protected]

  1

  I woke up, barely opening my bleary eyes before stretching. Clunk! My eyes snapped open as I wondered why the hell my hand had connected with something hard in bed. “Oh no,” I said, touching the clear, glassy shell that enclosed me. “Oh, no, no, no. Damn you, Tess!” I reached out for my phone that I always kept beside me for just this reason. I hadn’t had it with me the morning I’d woken surrounded by thorny rose vines, so I’d been bloody careful since then. I felt around on the sheets, unable to look away from the thick glass case. It wasn’t even that close to me, I had to extend my arms out fully to touch it, but my breath was already starting to come in faster and shallower. “Breathe, breathe,” I said, but my heart just started to gallop. I turned on my side deliberately to actually search for my phone. All I had to do was find it, ring Tess and she’d come and get me out of this. She’d better. It was then I saw where my phone was, lying outside of my glass cocoon, a slightly warped dark-grey shape.

  “Fuck!” The tide of anxiety I was trying to hold back rose and swamped me. I really needed a piss, I always did in the morning, like any bloody normal person. What was I going to do? My bladder felt like a bomb sitting between my legs, just waiting to go off. And how much oxygen did I have in this thing? I looked around me for air holes or vents anywhere. I started to pant, it didn’t have any. It was then that I realised why; this was a glass coffin.

  “Snow fucking White. Tess, are you serious?” I smacked my head back on my pillow and tried to get my mind to race as fast as my heart. What happened in the Disney movie? She took a bite of the poisoned apple, and the dwarves buried her in a glass coffin, and then . . . her prince arrived and gave her true love’s kiss. I cursed, slamming my palms into the lid of the coffin, getting nothing more than sore hands for my efforts. Waiting around to be rescued, typical damned Tess. I was going to kill my sister when I got to work.

  I knew there was no point, but I kicked the glass and when that didn't work, felt with tender fingers along the surface, looking for a catch or even a seam where the lid met the base of the coffin, but it all just felt resolutely smooth and cool. I belted the casket one more time with my elbow out of sheer frustration. “Ow! Ow! Ow! Mother fucking . . .”

  My eyes snapped open as I felt a slight breeze on my face. A go
rgeous-looking guy peered down at me with a dumbstruck expression. “Madam, are you quite well?”

  “Oh, God, yes!” I vaulted to my feet, shoved the lid off the coffin and made a beeline for the bathroom. “Gotta go, gotta go, gotta go,” I said and then slammed the door behind me. “Blessed, blessed relief,” I said, relaxing muscles I didn’t know I’d been holding tight. I took deep breaths, sucking in the clean, though perhaps not sweet-smelling, air. I was never taking oxygen for granted again.

  “Ah, madam . . .?” The toilet door handle began to twist.

  “Are you serious? I’m on the loo!” I quickly finished off the process and yanked my pyjama pants up as he opened the door.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t under . . . Oh!” the prince’s face was a picture of mortification as he saw exactly what he’d opened it on. “I’ll wait out here then.”

  “You think?” I snapped before slamming the door, locking it and heading over to the sink to wash my hands. Then I saw it. “Oh, you’ve got to be joking.” In the mirror instead of my usual shaggy light-brown hair and hazel eyes, I had waist-length black hair, cornflower-blue eyes, and skin that looked like it had never seen the sun. I scrubbed at my mouth, which currently looked like I’d put on bright-red lipstick before bed. Nope, that wasn’t working. Looks like I was stuck with this for today. I opened the bathroom door with a frown.

  “Who opens the door on someone going to the toilet?” I snapped.

  “I apologise most profusely, madam. I had no idea you were using the facilities. My horse led me to your building, and I climbed your many stairs to come to your room and find the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, in a glass coffin. I felt a completely overwhelmingly need to kiss you . . . like I do now.” He started to lean towards me, puckering his lips.

  “Ah, no! None of that! Seriously, you saw someone in a coffin, and you felt like kissing them? Is that normal? I’ve never really thought about it before, but it's kinda weird to go around trying to kiss girls who’ve been laid to rest.”

  “Well, it was obvious you weren’t dead. You were hitting your bed and crying a little–”

  “Was not!”

  “Well, perhaps it was perspiration. I apologise again. I’m not normally so completely devoid of manners. May I introduce myself? I am Prince Harold of the Eastern Marches.” I took his hand and shook it despite wanting to just throw him out on the street. As with every other manifestation of my grandmother’s spell, he would only last the day. He could fend for himself on the mean streets of a modern metropolis, couldn’t he? I let out a long sigh, pulling my hand back and scrubbing at my scalp. I was a bitch, but not that much of a bitch. I checked him out, it was the usual combination of high cheekbones, strong jaw, a wave of black hair and piercing blue eyes. We looked more like brother and sister than potential lovers.

  “Look, I’ve got to get dressed and get ready for work. You can come and stay with me and the gang at the Magicorium for the day, we’ll keep you out of trouble. You’ll be back in the Eastern Marches this time tomorrow. Just . . . no more trying to kiss me, OK?”

  “Of course, that was a . . . well two, unforgivable lapses. I’m not sure what a Magicorium is, but I’m sure it will be delightful.”

  “It’s my grandmother’s, was my grandmother’s magic shop,” I said, “and now it’s mine and my sister’s.”

  2

  “Tess!” I shoved open the front door of McKinnon’s Magicorium, the many brass bells, which hung on the back, smashing against each other in a noisy clang rather than their usual more genteel twinkle. “Jez, where the hell is my sister?”

  “Morning, Ash. What are we today?” Jez , looking me over with a broad smile. Jez had worked for my grandmother before we inherited the business and was in her late 20s, like me. Unlike me, she embraced the whole witchcraft thing, rocking a kind of quirky Goth vibe with ripped black jeans, big boots, heavy black-rimmed glasses, and a black t-shirt that read 'Witches aren’t real? Weird, I’m standing right here.’ “Aurora? No, that was last week. Belle?”

  “Fuck off, you know exactly who I am.”

  “Rapunzel? The hair is longer but not that long.”

  “Jez, where’s Tess?”

  “In the back, Snow White. Ah, and this must be your prince.” Prince Harold came inside the door, eyes wide. I couldn’t take him in the car because he had a bloody huge horse waiting for him downstairs. The shop was only a couple of blocks from my apartment, so I gave him directions and told him to meet me here. Obviously, negotiating a horse in peak-hour traffic was a bit of an eye-opener.

  “Harold, this is Jez. Jez, babysit the prince for me.”

  “Well, sure,” she said with a purr and waved him over, settling him down in one of the big velvet-covered armchairs we kept in the reading area.

  “My lady, if you are about to face a challenge, I should be by your side,” he said as I moved to the back of the shop, trying to get up, but Jez pushed him firmly down.

  “I’m just going to talk to my sister. It’s OK.”

  She knew before I even opened my mouth. “I’m sorry! I didn’t read anything last night, I promise!”

  “So, how the hell did I wake up inside a glass coffin?”

  “I-I dreamt about that time Nan and Pa took us to see Snow White at the cinema. Do you remember?”

  “You vomited popcorn all over me in the car ride home. Of course, I remember. Jesus, Tess, couldn’t you call me? Do you know what it’s like to wake up in a coffin?”

  “I know, I know, and with your claustrophobia and everything. I sent you a text. You said you were going to keep your phone on you.”

  I grabbed my phone out, and sure enough, she’d sent me several texts. I sighed, “So it’s not just what you’re reading. Dammit, I thought we had this sorted.”

  “It’s not going to stop, not until the conditions of the spell are fulfilled. You know that.”

  She was right, I just didn’t want to know it. When the family had attended the reading of Nan’s will, specifically the part when she said she’d willed us ownership of her old magic–sorry, occult supplies–store, we had been shocked. That had shifted into disbelief and questions about Nan’s mental health when the lawyer read out, “And tell my granddaughters that I love them, that I always regret not being able to live long enough to see them continue to grow into the amazing women they already are. But I am an old meddler, and I can’t help but use the power I have left and leave as my dying wish that each of you will find true happiness and someone to share your life with. I have crafted a spell on the Magicorium that will activate the moment the two of you take over the shop.”

  There had been a lot of mumbling and eyebrow raising at that. Nan had always sworn black and blue that magic was real and the rest of us were tolerant of this. My Pa always said, “Well, you sure cast your spell over me the moment I laid eyes on you.”

  “Because I pulled you away from kissing Cissy Black? That was no magic; that was just good luck on your part,” Nan would reply.

  “OK, well, we certainly can’t control what you dream about, I guess. I’ll open up the shop and pry the prince out of Jez’s claws.”

  “Prince Charming is here?” Tess asked with a squeal.

  “Yeah, I felt too mean just leaving him on the street. Come and meet him. He’s very polite.”

  “And good-looking? He must be good-looking!”

  “They’re all good-looking, even that weird elf guy with the purple eyes and the tinsel hair was pretty.”

  “And did he kiss you awake?”

  “No, he just opened the coffin. I was well and truly awake by that point.”

  “But Ash, a kiss from a prince is–”

  “Pretty sure swapping spit with royalty is much the same as with any other guy. You could kiss him if you like. I’m sure he’d be amenable.” I pointed to where the prince sat, still looking a bit freaked out. “It might help him calm down a bit.” I ran over to the door and flipped the ‘Open’ sign, wishing, praying that today s
ome of what used to be a steady stream of customers would walk in.

  “I can’t,” Tess said, but I could see the longing in her eyes as she stared at the prince. This was the one thing I’d never understand about Nan’s spell. Every morning, I woke up in a different scenario, all determined by what my sister had read, watched, or dreamed about the previous night. Why wasn’t I visited by what I dreamed about?

  I walked over to the stool behind the cash register and picked up the tattoo magazine Jez had been reading. Tess and Jez were cooing over the prince, plying him with tea and biscuits. I rolled my eyes. He was good-looking, I gave them that, but he was so clean-cut and polite it did nothing for me. No, if I was to be woken every morning by what I dreamed about, he'd look more like this, I thought as I stared at the full-page photo in the mag. The model was tall, muscular but not too bulky, tattooed and had long golden hair and a bit of a beard. Yeah, if I woke up to this, I’m not sure I’d come into work at all. . . . I was jerked out of my little fantasy by the sound of the doorbells tinkling.