A/N: It annoys me that Joshua and company disappear from the game after you finish Honest Hearts, so I like to imagine that he and the Dead Horses stayed in Zion for awhile at least, and that the Courier visits them every few months.
"Courier?"
At the familiar, rasping, slightly muffled voice, Cora looked up from stuffing tins of Cram into her pack. Joshua Graham approached, his weathered, beaten Bible gripped in one bandage-wrapped hand. The Dead Horses camp was still relatively quiet in the early light of dawn, the first rays of sunlight turning the stone of the clifftops above to peach, though the valleys below were yet shadowed.
"I wanted to ask if you would receive benediction before you go," Graham said, halting a couple paces away.
Cora's brow furrowed as she straightened, pushing a few wayward strands of blonde hair away from her face. There was a word she hadn't heard often. "Benediction?" She asked, "What does that mean?"
"Before the war, church services would often end with the bestowing of benediction upon the congregation," The Burned Man explained patiently. "It is a blessing of sorts."
"You want to bless me, so God will watch over me in the Mojave?" Cora guessed, finding her heart warmed at the thought that he cared enough about her to do something like this.
"The Lord shall watch over you whether I bless you or not," Graham said, "But…I suppose it would make me feel better."
Cora studied him for a moment. Though his face was obscured by bandages, they only served to make the smoky blue of his eyes that much more intense. She could see in them that he wanted her to say yes, almost desperately. It seemed a harmless enough request, she thought.
"Sure, Joshua," She said, giving him a reassuring smile. "That sounds great."
Some of the tension visibly left Graham's shoulders. "Thank you," He rasped, before straightening and clearing his throat as he opened to a place, bookmarked, Cora noticed, in his Bible. "Would you please bow your head?"
Cora did as she was bid, fixing her gaze on the snakeskin of his boots, and felt a slight shock run through her as Graham's cloth-wrapped hand came to rest upon her scalp with a gentleness she hadn't realized he was even capable of. Briefly she wondered what he might have been like had the flames not happened, had the Legion not happened…had the bombs themselves not happened.
"Now may the Lord bless you," He said, and though Cora knew he was reciting, she was surprised to hear genuine sincerity in his voice. "And keep you. The Lord lift His countenance upon you and give you peace. The Lord make His face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you, both now and forevermore. Amen."
His hand left her scalp, leaving a cool place where its warmth had been. The Courier was silent for a moment, unsure if he was finished, but he was. She had half-expected something long-winded and full of convoluted allegory, as he was prone to when in one of his moods.
"Thank you, Joshua," She told him with a warm smile, "That was very sweet of you."
The corners of Graham's eyes crinkled, and though his face was covered, Cora felt that he was smiling behind the bandages.
"Safe travels, Courier."
A/N: If anyone's curious, Joshua's blessing comes from Numbers 6:24-26.