Ruth and the King of the Giants: A Seven Kingdoms Tale 5 (The Seven Kingdoms) Read online

  Ruth and the King of the Giants

  A Seven Kingdoms Tale 5

  S.E. Smith

  Acknowledgments

  I would like to thank my husband Steve for believing in me and being proud enough of me to give me the courage to follow my dream. I would also like to give a special thank you to my sister and best friend, Linda, who not only encouraged me to write, but who also read the manuscript. Also to my other friends who believe in me: Julie, Jackie, Christel, Sally, Jolanda, Lisa, Laurelle, Debbie, and Narelle. The girls that keep me going!

  And a special thanks to Paul Heitsch, David Brenin, Samantha Cook, Suzanne Elise Freeman, and PJ Ochlan – the awesome voices behind my audiobooks!

  – S.E. Smith

  Contents

  Copyright

  Synopsis

  Cast of Characters

  Prologue

  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

  Epilogue

  Experience The Stories

  About the Author

  Paranormal Romance

  RUTH AND THE KING OF THE GIANTS: SEVEN KINGDOMS TALE BOOK 5

  Copyright © 2019 by S.E. Smith

  First E-Book Published September 2019

  Cover Design by Melody Simmons

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission from the author.

  All characters, places, and events in this book are fictitious or have been used fictitiously, and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations are strictly coincidental.

  Summary: A human woman’s determination to find her missing brother leads her to a magical world where giants live – and she finds love.

  ISBN: (KDP Paperback) 9781688208254

  ISBN: (eBook) 9781944125806

  {Romance (love, explicit sexual content) – Action/Adventure – Fantasy Dragons & Mythical Creatures – Contemporary – Paranormal (Magic).}

  Published by Montana Publishing.

  www.montanapublishinghouse.com

  Synopsis

  The King of the Giants has met his match…

  When her brother goes missing, Ruth Hallbrook follows the only lead that she has – a story told to her by a strange woman she meets in town. Armed with a ‘magical’ shell that will supposedly guide her, all she has to do is repeat the words she hears when she puts it to her ear. That would have been fine if she could have understood what it was saying! One wrong word lands her in a kingdom filled with giants, including one very large, irritating one who thinks she belongs in his gilded cage – fat chance of that!

  An opportunity to escape for a little peace and quiet turns into a disaster when Koorgan, the King of the Giants, finds himself stuck in an old well. Unable to climb out, he is sure his only hope of rescue is the search party eventually finding him. The last thing he expects is his rescuer to be barely larger than his hand.

  Afraid that something might happen to the tiny creature, he feels duty bound to help her find her missing brother and return her to her world. The trouble is, the more time he spends with her, the less he wants to let her go.

  Life is dangerous on the Isle of Giants for the diminutive Ruth. It will take every skill this King of the Giants possesses to protect her. Guided by the legend of a mythical plant said to have created the giants, Koorgan will not rest until he finds a way to keep Ruth by his side. Find out if love can overcome the barrier created by a misspoken spell!

  Cast of Characters

  Isle of the Giants: Kingdom of the Giants

  Giants:

  Koorgan: King of the Giants

  Gant: Second-in-Command of the Giants

  Edmond: Elder guard and Third-in-Command of the Giant palace guards

  Hermon: giant – tends the magic mushrooms of the giants

  Madura: half-witch/half giant: Spellbinder of the giants

  Pirates:

  Ashure Waves: King of the Pirates

  Bleu LaBuff: Ashure’s Second-in-Command of the Pirates and Captain of one of the Pirate Fleet

  Dapier: Ashure’s Head of Acquisitions for his ship

  Humans:

  Ruth Hallbrook: Forensic Accountant and sister of Mike Hallbrook

  Mike Hallbrook: Detective with the Yachats Police Department and Ruth Hallbrook’s brother

  Tonya Maitland: human, Undercover investigative reporter pretending to be an FBI agent investigating the disappearances in Yachats, Oregon.

  Asahi Tanaka: human, CIA Agent investigating the disappearances in Yachats, Oregon

  Gabe Lightcloud married to Magna: human, works for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife collecting data.

  Dr. Kane Field married to Magna: human doctor from Yachats, Oregon.

  Carly Tate married to Drago: Banking Associate from Yachats, Oregon

  Jenny Ackerly married to Orion: School Teacher and Carly’s best friend

  Ross Galloway: human, Fisherman from Yachats, Oregon

  Seven Kingdom Characters:

  Magna (Sea Witch) married to Gabe Lightcloud and Kane Field: half witch/half sea people. She is Orion’s distant cousin on his father’s side

  Drago married to Carly Tate: King of the Dragons.

  Orion married to Jenny Ackerly: King of the Isle of the Serpent (Merpeople)

  Marina married to Mike Hallbrook: Witch

  Magika: Queen of the Isle of Magic

  Oray: King of the Isle of Magic

  Nali: Empress of the Monsters

  Prologue

  Six months before:

  JFK Airport, New York City

  “Damn it, sis! Don’t you ever answer your phone? This is Mike. I wanted to let you know that I’m okay. Listen, something incredible has happened, but I wanted to let you know that I’m safe – and happy. Oh, Charlie is with me, so don’t worry about the damn dog. I’ve met the most incredible woman. She’s from another world, honest to god, she is. I know how that sounds, but I…”

  Ruth Hallbrook muttered under her breath in frustration as her brother’s message got crazier and crazier. He spun an incredibly detailed fairy tale that he seemed to whole-heartedly believe, and then the message abruptly ended mid-sentence.

  Weaving in and out of the crowded airport terminal, she pressed the play button on her phone again and held her cell phone to her ear. Her purse strap started to slip and she had to lift her shoulder to keep it and her briefcase strap from falling off her shoulder – not an easy feat while she was pulling her carry-on behind her. She gritted her teeth when two young girls suddenly stopped in front of her and she almost ran into them.

  “Watch out!” she barked out in a sharp voice.

  The girls rolled their eyes at her as she passed them. Tension built in her when she realized she still had four more gates to go before she reached her destination. Fear, adrenaline, anger, and caffein
e had been her constant companions for the past twelve hours.

  She had been working overseas as a consultant for the last three and a half weeks and hadn’t bothered with her personal cell phone once the battery died on it. She’d thought she had forgotten her charger, and since she and Mike only chatted once a month, she hadn’t worried about her dead phone as she knew she would be back home before their next scheduled call. If something really important happened, Mike knew he could contact her on her work phone.

  When she discovered that she had put it in a different zippered pocket of her suitcase, she had charged her phone this morning while frantically getting ready for the airport.

  His message had been the last one in her voicemail. All the other messages had been spam except for the reminder that she had a dentist appointment coming up and the message from a man named Asahi Tanaka who claimed to be a CIA agent – a claim that a friend of a friend had verified for her. Unfortunately, the long line of messages had filled up her voicemail box, and the most important message of all was cut short.

  “I swear if I get one more call about a new Visa, the IRS coming to lock me up, or my car warranty expiring, I’m going to reach through the phone, throttle the assholes on the other end, and tell them to get a real job!” she growled as she briskly walked through the JFK airport in New York.

  She must have spoken a bit louder than she’d realized because several people turned to stare at her. They quickly turned their focus elsewhere when she shot them a heated glare. She glanced at the ticket in her hand. She had changed her New York to California connecting flight to Portland, Oregon instead so she could find out what in the hell was going on herself.

  “This is so coming out of his Christmas present,” she muttered as she pressed redial.

  “Come on, Mike, pick up! You complain about me not answering the damn phone when you call,” she muttered.

  Ruth grimaced when she heard the last boarding call for her flight, followed by an announcement to her, Ruth Hallbrook, to please check in with an airline representative at the gate.

  “What the fuck do you think I’m trying to do?” she crossly snapped.

  She made it to the gate before they finished saying the message a second time. Gripping her phone in a white-knuckled grasp, she thrust her boarding pass at the gate attendant. The woman looked at her, opened her mouth, then closed it. Ruth knew exactly why – she looked like something the dog had not only dragged in, but had buried for a few days before digging it up.

  That’s what happens when you complete a month of long meetings, find out your frigging brother has disappeared not once, but twice, and discover that he left a cryptic message about an incredible woman from another world on the cell phone you had to turn off during takeoff. Then add in a flight halfway across the world. Mike’s probably off to visit ET at Area 51, by now. He’ll just traipse over to the bottom of Meteor Crater, except, oh wait, that’s been moved to the Devil’s Tower made out of mashed potatoes! she tiredly thought, realizing in that moment just how many weird movies she had watched.

  An inelegant snort of laughter escaped her at the thought. The unexpected laughter caused the flight attendant standing in the door of the jet to give her a questioning look as she entered the plane. Shaking her head, Ruth passed the attendant and moved down the aisle to her seat. She stored her carry-on in the overhead compartment, tucked her briefcase under the seat in front of her, and sighed as she sank down into her seat in the First Class section.

  She toed off her high heels, wiggled her toes, and fastened her seat belt. The man sitting in the window seat next to her looked vaguely familiar, but he just glanced at her and smiled before he went back to reading his newspaper. That suited Ruth just fine. She was in no mood to endure polite social interactions at the moment. She was too busy plotting where she was going to bury her brother’s body.

  Another tired sigh left her as the flight attendant began the safety presentation. She glanced at the headline of the newspaper the man was holding – ‘Independent Audit Exposes Major Embezzlement in Largest On-line Retail Corporation’. Her lips curled into a menacing smile that made the flight attendant stammer over what to do if they had to make an emergency water landing before Ruth took pity on the woman, leaned her head back, and closed her eyes.

  And people think the police have all the fun, she wearily thought.

  She had been the lead forensic auditor on the case presented by the government, and the discrepancies she discovered had opened a can of worms that would keep fishermen supplied for centuries. That case had closed right before she left for Europe, but the trial hadn’t started until yesterday. The case was a big reason why her most recent client had hired her. She was a brilliant detective when it came to numbers.

  Her brother, on the other hand, was a great detective for the Yachats, Oregon Police department, which was why it was so strange for him to leave everything so abruptly to run off with some woman. He loved his job. He was good at it. That town needed him, and he knew it.

  Still unable to sleep thirty minutes later, Ruth opened her eyes, turned on her phone, and scrolled through the automated text record of the message Mike had left her. I’ve met the most incredible woman….

  When his department had informed her of his disappearance late last night, Ruth had demanded they send their entire case findings to her and keep her updated. One advantage to having friends in high places who hoped she would never thoroughly audit their finances was that when she asked for help, she was never denied.

  Three hours in the Business Lounge at Heathrow had given her a chance to print out and read through the documents. She’d spent the flight to New York messaging back and forth with the Police Department, the FBI, and Agent Asahi Tanaka who had also emailed her.

  Pursing her lips, she dragged her briefcase out from under the seat and removed the manila folder and a pen from inside the case. She pulled down the tray from the back of the seat in front of her, and opened the folder. Inside was her brother’s banking and credit card information, and the reports and photos from the investigation to date. The most recent documents were the letters Mike had faxed right before her transatlantic flight had departed.

  His office had sent her copies of his letter of resignation and a report indicating that the missing persons’ cases he had been working on had a happy ending. Jenny Ackerly and Carly Tate, the two missing women, were fine. They had just decided to leave as suddenly and inexplicably as he had, and had decided to stay off the grid while their loved ones worried – for years in Carly Tate’s case. There was a smiling picture of them to prove it.

  The most recent photos taken at Mike’s home made it seem as if he’d left voluntarily. The lock wasn’t picked, as far as the investigators could tell, and there were now pictures and clothes missing. Was she supposed to believe Mike thought he didn’t need clothes when he first went missing, but now he did?

  Something had happened in the brief time since she’d last talked to him. Mike’s message would have her believe that he’d met a woman and just disappeared from the face of the Earth, leaving everything behind except his wallet, keys, phone, and his dog. Was Ruth the only one that thought something pretty damn, fucking weird was going on?

  “Nothing – absolutely frigging nothing,” she muttered under her breath as she stared at the statements. “No purchases, no withdrawals, no credit card usage,” she fumed, doodling on the paper as she thought.

  “Ma’am, your drink order?” the flight attendant asked.

  Ruth glanced up at the woman looking expectantly at her, and Ruth realized that this must be the second time the flight attendant had asked the question.

  “Bourbon on the rocks,” she requested.

  “Yes, ma’am. Would you like the chicken or salmon dinner?” the flight attendant continued.

  “Chicken,” Ruth distractedly replied, tapping the tip of the pen on the paper in front of her.

  She returned her attention to the financial records in front of her.
The flight attendant brought the drink that she had requested and Ruth gave a brief murmur of thanks. She sat back as the woman handed the man beside her his drink.

  “A Bourbon Woman. I haven’t met one of those in a while,” the man sitting next to her commented with a flirty tone.

  Either the guy is hard up or I don’t look as bad as I thought I did – which is a shame because it would save him from being eaten alive – especially since I remember why he looks familiar now, she thought in resignation.

  “I’m not surprised,” she replied, her tone dismissive as she returned her attention to the folder.

  “Are you having a little trouble balancing your bank account? My ex-wife thought if there are checks in the checkbook, there must be money in the bank. Women! I swear if you don’t put them on an allowance, they wouldn’t know what to do,” the man chuckled.

  Ruth stared at the back of the seat in front of her, her fingers curling around her pen with more force than necessary. She looked down at the paper and smiled when she saw that her doodling had produced a coffin with a stick figure of her brother trying to climb out of it.