Nightingale Girl Read Online Free PDF

is my father. I’m still mixed-blood. I’m sinful. I’ll taint their bloodline. I’m not welcome in this place.
    The sounds of a melodic whistle and roller skates sliding over smooth pavement break the night.
    Nightingale skates up next to me. “He’s a dick,” she says, her voice chipper.
    “Yup.”
    “Don’t take it personal. He’s just mad. And our kind don’t trust lightly.”
    “Heard that before.” I cross my arms and control the urge to do something bad, like rip all the blossom heads off the flowers and leave them on Remiel’s bedspread. “I hate this.”
    “We weren’t always crazy assholes.” Nightingale pushes off and skates around the fountain in a blur. The snow-white feathers of her wings flutter.
    “Sure.”
    I feel myself shutting her out. I can deal with a lot of shit, but I thought this was going to be different. My father is King Gabriel—he welcomed me here with open arms—but it seems, besides Sparrow, he is the only one happy about my presence.
    Nightingale skates backward around the fountain. “You should know we are a family of cursed Angels. The only way to fix us is for Sparrow to take his turn as a Hellion. The eldest from each generation is required to do so. Sparrow has been gone a really long time, and now he has to be sent away again. Our father is an angry bastard because he never did his time when he was called. Sparrow hasn’t, either. Yet. He strayed to your father’s kingdom, but the curse caught up with him. That’s why Sparrow’s brains are scrambled. That’s why mine are, too. It affects all the children—each generation until someone finally goes. Mine and Sparrow’s children would be crazier than each of us.” Coming to a stop in front of me, Nightingale frowns. “No one will touch me up here. I’m plagued. An aberration.”
    I swear to God I feel my heartbeat stop. Sparrow can never be a Hellion. Not after what they did to me.
    “You look sick,” Nightingale says. “You should go find him.”
    I close my eyes, focus on Sparrow, and— poof —I’m out of there.
    When I open my eyes again, I’m standing next to Sparrow in some weird war room decorated with maps and strange weapons. Remiel is there, as well, and he doesn’t look happy to see me.
    “This is no place for your kind,” Remiel says. “Blasphemy that you were allowed within the Seven Kingdoms of Heaven in the first place. Council knew better.”
    Jim’s father on the earthen plane didn’t like my blood, either. They’ll never get my stains out.
    King Gabriel was right: these guys are assholes.
    Ignoring Remiel, I turn to Sparrow. “A Hellion? A Hellion ? How could you keep this from me?”
    “He is the heir to the throne,” Remiel replies before Sparrow opens his mouth to speak. “He will do his time. He will heal this family, and he will not taint it with your mixed blood.”
    “I didn’t ask you,” I say.
    Remiel looks like he could kill me. “And I didn’t invite you to come here. You don’t belong. You are darkness, sin, and wickedness.”
    “Stop,” Sparrow tells his father. “I’ll do it. I’ll set things right. This is my duty.”
    “Sparrow, you can’t,” I say.
    “I have to.” He won’t look at me.
    The darkness may be calling, beckoning me from the distance between realms, but that is not a place for Sparrow. We barely survived last time we were there.
    Remiel starts talking. Going on and on about the Council and pride and—bullshit really.
    I take Sparrow’s hand.
    Poof.
    We’re in my room in the basement of Remiel’s castle.
    “I have to go, Meg.” Sparrow touches me. I notice this time that his head cocks to the side, just a tiny bit. Almost a nervous tick, if I didn’t know better.
    “You hid this from me?”
    Sparrow nods. “I can’t help it now. It was easier to stop before. Control the muscles.” He sighs. “I have to fix this.” His fingers twitch. “I’ll be fine.”
    “Those are Hellions.”
    “It will be okay.”
    “Those