Heather Fleming

Arizona’s still as warm as ever, but even if the mercury plummets, neither Eden nor Abdiel will be bothered by the cold. Just last week they went to visit a couple of their gargoyle friends in the Himalayas. Abdiel wore one of his leather dusters. Eden didn’t even bother with a jacket.

So Eden is surprised when Abdiel walks into the war room, where she’s studying his notes on hellspawn, and asks if she knows how to make hot chocolate.

“It’s not that hard,” she tells him, trying not to raise an eyebrow at the odd question. “You just pour hot water over a couple tablespoons of hot chocolate mix and stir.

“Do we have any hot chocolate mix?” Abdiel wants to know.

“I didn’t buy any, no,” Eden says. “Why?”

“No reason,” Abdiel responds.

But by living with Abdiel for two months has taught Eden that he never asks something for no reason. Abdiel sits down and starts working on a translation of some demonic runes. Once he’s engrossed in his work, she slips out of the room and into the kitchen.

It’s definitely easier using powdered hot chocolate mix, but Eden doesn’t mind improvising. She puts half a bar of Hershey’s chocolate into the food processor and lets the whirring blades do their work, while she heats up some milk. Then, she splits the chocolate shavings up between two mugs and pours the hot liquid over them. On a whim, she tops both cups with whipped cream and two squares of chocolate before she takes them back to the war room.

Abdiel looks up with an odd expression on his face the moment she enters the room.

“Hot chocolate,” Eden tells him. She hesitates because, for a moment, Abdiel looks like he’s just been sucker punched. “That’s what you wanted . . . right?”

Abdiel blinks twice. “Yes – but you didn’t have to run off and make this for me, Sis.”

“It wasn’t any trouble.”

She takes him his mug because he seems rooted in place.

“Thank you,” he says, but he doesn’t immediately take a sip. Instead he stares at the toppings, and Eden wonders if she should have scrounged up some marshmallows instead.

“Is something wrong?” she asks.

“No, nothing’s wrong,” Abdiel’s quick to assure her. “It’s just . . .”

“You’d rather have marshmallows than whipped cream?”

“No. I have to ask though . . . is this how Holly served hot chocolate? With whipped cream and a piece of chocolate on top?”

“No.” Eden is confused now. “Why?”

“Because this is exactly how our mom used to make it,” Abdiel tells her. “Whipped cream and two squares of chocolate. That’s how Dad liked it.”

“Oh.”

Eden wishes that she had something better to say, but Abdiel talks about their birth parents even less than he talks about the family that adopted him, and she doesn’t really know how to respond now. She’s relieved when her brother takes a sip then flashes a smile warm enough to melt chocolate by itself.