Chapter 9

“I understand.” She’s looking directly at him. “I don’t comprehend.”

“What, River, what don’t you comprehend?” Mal snaps. “What is it?”

River frowns. “Not you.”

And then he really looks at her. She’s not looking at him. She’s looking through him. He turns and steps aside, leaving a clear space between her and Shepherd Book.

“I see everything. I can’t not. I see what you did. I know what you were.”

Mal’s mouth sets in a grim line. “Preacher…” He’s drawing his gun.

Juliet grabs his arm in a vice grip, eyes fixed on River. “No touching guns.”

Mal re-holsters the pistol, noticing out of the corner of his eye Zoë doing the exact same thing. “What were you, preacher?” she asks calmly, though Mal can detect the edge in her voice that says she’s anything but inside.

Book looks around the assembled faces. Kaylee’s shock, Mal’s anger, Zoë’s calm danger, they all hurt him. That it would come to this.

“It’s not what you think. I didn’t do that to her. I didn’t, I…”

“You’re here to take her back?” Simon’s face looks like he would be prepared to take Jayne’s gun from the big man’s holster and shoot him if he said yes.

“No.”

Juliet takes one of the Shepherd’s hands, holding it up. He doesn’t stop her. “Hands of blue, take you away to the other side. Can’t stop. Will never stop. Just keep coming and coming, ‘till they get back what you took.”

Mal’s hand strays to his gun again.

River shakes her head at him. “No touching.”

“Fine. Let him give me a reason not to.”

“Very well.” Book’s eyes lock on his. “You want to know about me, I’ll tell you.”

“Finally!”

“Jayne. Shut-up.”

“Thank you.” He nods to Zoë. “Right. I fought during the war on the side of the Alliance.”

“Thought there might be something of that sort,” admits Mal.

“But, unlike you and Zoë, I wasn’t on the front line. I was doing my usual job. Recruiting people to serve the Alliance. Cheap labour.”

“Slaves…”

“Captain, I am not proud of many things I have done. I took the able bodied, the likely candidates for the independent arm