Wulfstan didn't quite know what to do.
It had been maybe an hour since he had crashed through his window, fear still thick, weighty under his skin. He hadn't uttered a word the entire time, unable to form a coherent thought, continuing to grasp onto the cloth pack that held the answers to all his questions. In the water basin they kept beside the stove, he had scrubbed and scrubbed the blood from his skin. He'd shed his gory tunic and trousers, leaving them to soak in water he pulled from the well. After all of that, he'd been able to lie down.
He wasn't alone, though.
Leofric had refused to leave and, as of this moment, his farm-work-built arms were wrapped around Wulfstan. That broad chest was pressed to Wulfstan's back and Leofric's face was hooked over his shoulder. All Wulfstan could hear was his breathing. A healthy thumping from his heartbeat echoed through Wulfstan's silent ribcage.
"Do you feel better?" Through all of Wulfstan's strange behaviour, Leofric had been nothing but understanding and caring. Even when he had to carefully pry the cloth pack from Wulfstan's hands, he'd seen the panic in his gaze, so Leofric had been exceptionally careful in putting it away, not even looking at the contents. He was far better at comforting than Wulfstan had ever been, so he was glad it wasn't Leofric in his place. "Should we sleep and talk in the morning?"
Finally, Wulfstan found his words. "No. I can talk now." He couldn't sleep so it was pointless to try. If Leofric stayed for any longer within the silence, Wulfstan could feel that the strange emotions he held for the farmer were at risk of spilling out. This situation was already difficult for him to handle, unable to tolerate the closeness, to compartmentalise how he had been shoved onto the bed and swaddled in an embrace. Especially knowing the truth of what their connection meant, Wulfstan couldn't keep his head on straight for much longer, those paintings swirling in his brain. "I… I went to the woods."
"The woods?" Leofric's voice was heavy with confusion. It was clear he didn't know the significance of what was being said. It had been half a decade – it was no surprise their meeting didn't s spring to the forefront of his mind. "Why? What's the woods got to give you?"
Wulfstan shifted, moving off his side so he could lay on his back. He didn't like how he couldn't see Leofric's face despite them being so close together; it unnerved him. "The place where your Mam and Da found me." He absentmindedly caught Leofric's hand in his own, entwining their fingers together, rubbing the skin on the back of his hand. Leofric didn't pull away. They were impossibly close, Leofric's other arm scooped under Wulfstan's neck. Closer than they'd managed to get in the downy meadow. Wulfstan wondered how Leofric could bear to press so firmly against such a frigid body. It lent him the thought that maybe his body didn't feel cold to the touch, perhaps. Not that he could know. Nor would he ask. "I was curious."
"Oh." Realisation had finally struck the farmer. In an impossibly small voice, dripping with apprehension, an undefinable terror thick in the words. "What d'ya find?"
"I…" Wulfstan didn't know what part of his discovery he could tell. He cared deeply for Leofric, and he knew Leofric felt similarly – if those writings were true, they were of the same soul, so that must mean something to their current relationship – but he didn't know if the farmer could handle the truth. Leofric had been a good church-going lad since birth; was there even a chance he could handle such a blow to his worldview? Could he tolerate the existence of Wulfstan, knowing he violated the very nature of the beliefs he harboured? The idea that the world, humans, were much, much older than he thought and that Wulfstan, some version of him at least, had once wandered the earth alongside some thousands of incarnations of Leofric? That they were bound together, not to be brothers but something more akin to spouse - impossible as that should be as men. It seemed unfeasible to ask so much of him. "Some evidence of a place I might've lived. Not much there and it might not even have been to do with me."
He hated lying to the other man, but he had no choice. There was comfort in knowing that it was more of a white lie, a half-truth. A lie by omission rather than fabrication.
That's what he told himself.
Leofric didn't think about the contents of the cloth satchel, how they seemingly disproved Wulfstan's statement. Nodding against Wulfstan's shoulder, Leofric mumbled, "I'm sorry you didn't get answers." With a heavy sigh, he tightened his grip on Wulfstan, squishing him into an even tighter embrace. Wulfstan wished he could feel the warmth he knew Leofric's body had. "But 'ow… that don't explain all that blood though. What 'appened?"
"Highwaymen, thieves or people of that ilk." It was the most
obvious conclusion. Wulfstan didn't want to admit to what he did but he knew it
would be better to say it was absolutely not his blood to assuage Leofric's
worry. "The leader, I presume, came at me and I… I did what I had to. He didn't
get a hit on me."
"In the Lord's name, Wulfstan, what d'ya do? That was more blood than from just getting him a few times in the face." Leofric did not seem to have been calmed by the admission, his voice rising as much as it could while he was whispering. "D'ya end up with a weapon or something?"
It embarrassed and disgusted Wulfstan that he could commit such violence so easily, so flippantly. It felt only right to confess to Leofric. Perhaps it would lessen the burden he felt at the likelihood he had killed a man, at the least permanently crippled him. One of the Ten Commandments had been horribly ignored tonight. Not like he could bring himself to care about a God that may not exists judgement for his actions: just Leofric's. "I just acted – it was me or him. What I did was… it was too far, I know, but I was terrified. I had to. I had to come back. I couldn't die, not when you wouldn't even know what had happened to me. I can't leave you like that." Wulfstan spilt his soul before he could think it through, his honest feelings tumbling from his lips with no consideration. He only realised he admitted to more than he had wanted to as the last word left his mouth.
Leofric was silent. The buzzing of the crickets outside the window became a droning, taunting cacophony, hiding even his breathing. It was horribly ominous.
"I understand."
Wulfstan startled. "You do?"
"Of course. Your life is worth a thousand of someone like that. Even if that is not a good Christian opinion, I believe our Lord will forgive me for it." Leofric pressed his forehead to Wulfstan's shoulder for a moment. As he sucked in a large, tired breath, he shifted his position pulling Wulfstan around so that his face was pressed to Leofric's chest, and his arms could completely crush them together. "I'd be beside myself until death if you 'ad vanished from my life. It's not by birth, but you are closer to my 'eart than any brother could be."
Everything stilled and Wulfstan smiled bitterly against the rough hemp tunic that clad Leofric's torso. His fingers curled into the fabric at the curve of the other man's back. "You and I are cut from the same cloth, it seems. Our thoughts are much alike, Leofric."