A/N: Dialouge directly stolen from Joss, I'm not proud. Story seed generously given to me by Rinny, and it is for her that this was written. Post Episode-Serenity Part II.

The Dark is but a courtesan

The Day a truer friend

The Night beguiles and decieves

The Light no falsehood sends

O! That day would never cease and spirit never fail

Then we would laugh ceaselessly

All full of joy and hale

He knelt before her as if in prayer, the feelings of the last hours sweeping over him and carrying him to a time before he'd left the secular world, though traces of it still clutched at him weakly, not terribly unlike wilting bramble vines. For a single moment, a miracle for any man, he didn't notice her stand before him.

Her touch was slightly unexpected when she daubbed at his forhead with a cool cloth, reminding him of the pain and blood his transgressionary sins made his penance.

"You really should have the young doctor look at this."

While inwardly he balms his soul in the jewelled tones of concern that spill from her votive-candle red lips, outwardly he can only make himself say, "It's not so bad."

And then she took her hand away, and he could not help but feel the loss deeply. "Well, I'm sure you'll be fine..."

"I didn't say that." He looked up at her, his dark eyes baring his conscience to her own molten gaze, fully expecting her to be disconcerted by the weakness of character, the drowning morass of loss in their depths. "Is this what life is, out here?"

"Sometimes."

Sometimes. And yet, here she was, unchanged from when last he saw her. When he'd brought her the evening meal, they had fallen into a restive moment, the easy banter she gracefully provoked with her tenderness. Neither of them had mentioned the surprise when they had been introduced by the Captain, which was a mercy. He hadn't any expectations that he would ever see her again, not after their first engagement.

And he hadn't expected her to know that ultimately, when he lost himself in her arms, the rich caramel velvet