This Place is Death (A Curse Keepers Secret) by Denise Grover Swank Read Free Book Online Page A

through with this little scheme, do you think your children will stop all their violence?”
    “It is worth the attempt.” Ahone took a step closer to Okeus. “Do not forget that you exist because of my generosity.”
    “ Your generosity ?” Okeus shrieked. “You created me in your pathetic attempt to save your favorite creation—humanity. Yet one more example of a deception that you have reasoned away with your good intentions.”
    “When the wind gods decreed I kill mankind or hand over the majority of my power, they never designated to whom I had to give my power. Can you blame me for looking for another way? I chose to create you and give you the power instead of sacrificing the human race. You cannot fault me for that. And if I was capable of such cleverness once, why assume that I would not be capable of saving humanity again? I’ve had eons to learn patience.”
    Okeus tilted his head, an evil grin stretching his mouth. “So you have been waiting for this opportunity.”
    Ahone didn’t answer.
    Okeus laughed. “Who would have thought that the good and loving Ahone would be capable of such an underhanded scheme? And here I thought you gave me all of your abhorrent traits.”
    Ahone remained expressionless. “Perhaps not all of them.”
    Okeus looked around the circle then toward the gate. “You know this seal won’t hold.”
    Ahone’s shoulder lifted into a half shrug. “I’m willing to take the risk.”
    Without warning, Okeus grabbed the pierced hands of each man, breaking their hold on each other. His fingertips seared the wound on Ananias’s palm, the smell of burning flesh filling the air.
    The god’s voice echoed throughout the forest. “Ahone may have the power to lock us away, but I give you the power to set us free. You are the Curse Keepers, and your progeny are destined to remain here in this area as guardians of the gate. The firstborn of each generation will become the Keeper at adulthood, passing their information along to the next in line, but keeping it secret from the rest of the world. The gate will hold until the Keepers join the marks on their palms, breaking the seal. And then your children’s children will rue the day you created this curse.”
    Okeus dropped their hands and Ananias looked at his palm, shocked to find a circle within a square burned into his skin. Manteo glanced at an identical mark on his own palm.
    “Son of the earth, send him away now!” Ahone’s voice boomed.
    Manteo locked arms with Ananias again, his eyes narrowing as he concentrated. “Okeus, brother of Ahone, creator of evil, go forth into the pits of hell.”
    Ahone’s mouth moved in silent mumbles. Power and magic saturated the air around them and Ananias had to fight to inflate his lungs, adding to his panic. The salt of sea air burned his nose and the taste of freshly tilled earth coated his tongue.
    “Do you offer your sacrifices to close the gate?” Ahone asked, his voice muffled by the curtain of magic.
    Sacrifices? Ananias had never agreed to a sacrifice.
    “Yes.” Manteo answered.
    Ahone turned to Ananias.
    What was he sacrificing? Did he even have a choice at this point? If he didn’t offer a sacrifice, the gate would burst open, and the angry demons and gods would be free to destroy his village. “Yes.”
    Blinding light burst from the gates and a vortex of hurricane-force wind pulled Okeus toward its center. Manteo clasped Ananias’s arm and both men struggled to remain upright.
    “Do not let your descendants forget this, for one day, you will pay!” Okeus shouted over the wind. “The curse will break and I will come back stronger than before. The Keepers that set me free will rue the day they were ever born and defile your names for creating the curse. Their only hope is to swear allegiance to me… then and only then will I show them my mercy. But if the Keepers dare to defy me, I will drag them to hell and torture them for a thousand years!”
    The vortex collapsed in on