Since Wulfstan and Leofric had found themselves now abandoned, alone, in the village, there had been many differences and strange behaviours in the people around them that they had failed to notice when Donngall and Ita had still been around. While several were negligible, easily unrelated to their deaths and likely just to do with the passage of time and human change, there were some that could not be written off so swiftly. Obvious and, seemingly, intentional changes.
Their sales at the market had been steadily falling since the funeral, but, initially, that was normal as that was the time of year when there was a lull in produce to sell anyway. However, after the incident with the Fisher triplets, which had been in the midst of the harvest season, there had been a drastic drop-off – they had sold nothing more than a few bundles of wheat and barley, let alone the meagre sacks of turnips and onions despite being the only sellers in the fief. It was notably peculiar, unlike anything that they'd ever experienced in all their years of selling at the market.
It made scrounging food and other home goods together increasingly difficult with no income. At the very least, their being farmers meant that what wasn't sold, and didn't have to be given to the nobles as tax, would hold them over. The benefit of only having one mouth to feed – Wulfstan, for once, found the fact he couldn't eat the food that humans did to be a blessing – and a pig who didn't need much beyond the leftovers. There was a struggle, but it was still within the realm of management.
However, it was beginning to dawn on Wulfstan that their situation could, very soon, become dire. That task of simply surviving was to become harder still – the family that they went for to breed their sow refused to let the men take their boar for the day. A deal that had been ongoing for a decade nulled in one visit with no explanation as to why.
Leofric, walking slightly behind Wulfstan, had come along as well to the meeting even though he wouldn't talk to the pig farmers anyway. Disgruntled, he kicked at the muddy road beneath his feet. "Why can't I do anything right?"
Just as frustrated and confused as the other man, Wulfstan did his best to rationalise what had been going on for the last five months. It reminded Wulfstan so aggressively of their troubles with making friends when they'd been younger before they'd given up – they'd had market respect, at least, but that was gone. Now there was no buffer, be that the market or Leofric's parents, between them and the villager's ire. "This isn't your fault. I don't know what's going on, but it's not your fault."
Stopping in his tracks, he looked out across the never-ending farmland, animals milling in their field and farmers toiling in others, and felt the helplessness that had been suffocating him recently surge forth. Despite the open air, Wulfstan felt as if he were trapped in a small box, the walls crushing in on him from all sides. He couldn't help but think that Donngall and Ita must be horribly disappointed in him, looking down, being unable to look after their only son. Fruitlessly, he wished he could do better by Leofric, rather than just harbouring unnatural feelings towards him and letting him starve.
Pressing his lips into a thin line, Wulfstan looked back at Leofric, who had squatted on the roadside and begun to stare intensely at the yellow flowers sprouting up from the shrubbery. There had been a dull lifelessness that had never left Leofric's eyes even nearly a year after his parents passing and his return to almost normalcy. Wulfstan didn't know if he'd ever see the man filled with the liveliness he'd once had again.
His golden eye reflected the pretty sprouts, a childish whimsy there that Wulfstan hadn't seen for a very long time. That was at least a positive sign.
"What's so interesting about them?" Wulfstan asked, crouching down next to the other man, their shoulders bumping against each other. He tilted his head so he could keep watching Leofric without being too obvious – there was no need to be so close to see the man, his vision good from any distance, but he enjoyed the subtle intimacy that he only shared with Leofric. Clasping his hands between his knees, Wulfstan nudged the other man slightly. "Hm?"
"They're just resilient, aren't they?" A strange smile curled his lips, though his eyebrows furrowed as if he was frowning. Contorting like he was going to weep, that look was concerning. Leofric reached his fingers out and, as gently as a man made for hard labour could, caressed the numerous petals. "Dandelions are seen as weeds. Unwanted. But they're so beautiful and tough – how could someone hate something just trying to survive?"
Wulfstan didn't know how to respond. He'd never heard Leofric say something so poetic before; it hadn't crossed his mind that the man, who had not so much as touched a book in his life, could sound so scholarly. Perhaps he'd been too used to the man speaking in such basic English that he hadn't realised he was far more articulate in his original tongue. As he turned Leofric's words over in his mind, breaking them apart but struggling to see if there really was a deeper meaning or if he was overthinking, he heard a rustling.
Pulling his eyes back from the middle distance, Wulfstan was startled when Leofric's hand reached past his head before a strange sensation tickled the back of his ear. Furrowing his brows in confusion, his baffled frown softened quickly when he saw that gentle smile creasing Leofric's handsome, grief-aged face. There was a glimmer in his eyes for a moment.
Curious as to what had just happened, Wulfstan's hand felt his left ear and realised, after a moment of being unable to identify what he was touching, that Leofric had tucked one of the dandelions he'd been admiring behind his ear. The long stem tangled in his thick curls, effectively anchoring it in place. Dense petals lightly tickled his temples when the wind blew. Dandelions didn't smell of much, not in comparison to the rest of the world, but Wulfstan could smell every single note of the floral scent.
Breaking their eye contact, Leofric began to stand up, muttering as if embarrassed. It seemed he hadn't intended for Wulfstan to hear his words but, of course, he did anyway.
"My dandelion."
It was a hushed whisper, practically just a breath, but it hit Wulfstan like a hay bale to the chest. If he didn't know any better – there was no world he would allow himself to imagine it, as it was not possible – he would have thought Leofric was clumsily romancing him with a small act of courtship. He'd seen women and their flowers from suitors before, fancy bouquets of wild blossoms picked from the heaths.
That was impossible. Leofric had probably meant that Wulfstan was simply reminiscent of a dandelion - tough but beautiful, a sentiment that was common opinion expressed on the rare occasion people spoke to him more than a sentence. It wasn't strange for Leofric to say that as one would have to be blind to call Wulfstan ugly, even if that beauty was markedly unusual. Unwanted by most but choosing to survive despite that. There were no underlying meanings or subtle hints. Wulfstan was Leofric's dandelion in the sense that Leofric was Wulfstan's home.
They were the only one each other had left. Indeed, they belonged to each other as brothers belonged to each other. No matter how Wulfstan yearned for more, there would never be anything but a brotherly compassion from Leofric.
Still, he would treasure the dandelion in his hair.
-
Days passed and that golden dandelion wilted in the clay vase he'd put it in. The small sprig of colour in their house was already ready to be tossed to the sow.
Wulfstan wallowed at the dining table before the dead flower, unwilling to let go of the gift Leofric had given him. It was too soon to let it be the end of the dandelion's existence. He cupped the flower's head in his long fingers, tenderly caressing the petals, though they were so fragile some of them came off in his hand. Ever so delicate, he couldn't help but feel like it was horribly poetic – breaking something he cherished because he was inhuman. Despising his tendency to find prophetic irony in simple things, the scrolls he'd read infecting his mind, he struggled to look away from the golden petals.
Pulling back, he looked at the little yellow spots on his palm with a sallow expression. The sound of the door opening piqued his interest and pulled him out of his stupor, though he remained disheartened.
At the entrance of Leofric, Wulfstan couldn't help but say, "It's dying. What do I do?" He held his petal-covered hand out in dismay, desperate for Leofric to do something, even though there was nothing to do. Wulfstan knew there wasn't anything to do; he wasn't young anymore, he understood what death was, that it was permanent, irreversible. Desperately, though, he wished to stop the inevitable, even if it was just for something as irrelevant as a dandelion.
Perhaps it was human nature, even if he wasn't human. Whatever he was, he despised the finality of death and all that came with it.
Leofric let out a sigh, though he looked slightly amused. There was a sympathetic curl to his lips as he walked over. The way he held himself in this moment was very reminiscent of Ita, soft, caring, and it plucked at Wulfstan's already trembling heartstrings. "Wulfstan, it was dead as soon as I picked it." Crouching slightly so he was eye-level with Wulfstan, still sitting slumped over the table, before taking his hand and closing it around the petals. Tapping his fingers against the back of Wulfstan's hand, he continued, "That's life, can't change it. But I'll get you some new flowers, I would have gotten you some sooner if I knew how much you loved them."
Despite the offer, there was still melancholy in Wulfstan's eyes. Looking up at Leofric, his brows knitted together, he said, "But this was the first gift you gave me. I don't want to throw it away or let the pig have it." His free hand reached out and wrapped it around the loose fist that Leofric held his other hand in. There was an insistence in his actions, desperation.
"It's alright. I can give you as many flowers as you want." Leofric seemed confused by Wulfstan's behaviour, but still, he soothed the man. It was never a hassle to him, lending comfort to the man, his closest companion. If anything, he liked that Wulfstan was having a moment of vulnerability, naiveté even, and was leaning on him instead of it always being him comforting Leofric. A spark lit in his mind. "I remembered something. Mam once told me you can keep flowers forever if you press them."
"Press them?"
"Just stay right here." Leofric responded, before pulling his hands away from Wulfstan and dashing off to his parent's old room. The man had not stepped foot in there since his Mam had died, a whole year ago now, but he didn't hesitate in his movement.
Wulfstan could hear rustling in the other room, things being moved and dropped to the floor, Leofric humming in annoyance to himself. It was clear he was looking for something but Wulfstan had no idea what. Waiting patiently, he continued to stare at the wilted dandelion, more of it's tiny, mildly scented petals drifting to the dark wood of the table. Every lost segment cracked his heart further, the death of the flower feeling like a betrayal of the highest order against Leofric's kindness in giving it to him at all.
A small exclamation caught Wulfstan's ear and Leofric's returning footsteps made him turn towards the doorway. The returning man held a small wooden clamp-like object in his hand, and a triumphant grin on his face. "Here it is!"
Furrowing his brow, Wulfstan tilted his head, trying to figure out what the hell the thing in Leofric's hand was. Before he could ask, the man had already started talking again.
"Mam used to dry flowers and sell them as perfume bouquets when we spent a long time on the road. It was good for trading for food while travelling, if we met the right people." Leoric explained, a nostalgic tone in his voice, a far off look in his eyes as he stared down at the wooden contraption. Remembering his mother, remembering the years pulling their cart across the country, all of it compiling into a confusing mass of emotions that couldn't express themselves properly. It all just left him slightly misty-eyed, a wistful breathiness in his voice, like he was building up to shedding tears. "We'd pick wildflowers together and she'd put them in one of these. It dries the flowers out eventually. There used to be a lot more… I don't know where they've ended up."
It finally clicked in Wulfstan's mind, his wallowing that had clouded his mind clearing away. "I understand now." His sullen look finally fled and, delicately, he picked up the dandelion. Holding it out, cupping it in his hands like it was the greatest treasure in the world, he asked, "Can we do that for my dandelion, please?"
"Of course."
With that, Leofric placed the wooden flower press on the table and gently took the dandelion off Wulfstan. So softly, not even a single new petal fell from its head, Leofric held it with one hand before getting on with what he needed to do. Pulling apart the two wood blocks, he placed the yellow flower on the bottom block before pushing the top block down onto it. Twisting some metal knobs, the gap between the top and bottom blocks vanished.
"Alright, all we need to do now is leave it for a month or so. Maybe more – I've never pressed a dandelion before." Leofric picked up the press, and left the main room to go to their shared room, the one that had once been Wulfstan's alone. After a moment, he came back. "I've put it on the table by your bed, so you can still see it when you wake up in the morning."
The off-handed tenderness of Leofric's actions overwhelmed Wulfstan with affection. That tether around his heart clenched tightly, like it was roused from its slumber by the gesture. Standing up, Wulfstan strode over to Leofric and crushed him into an embrace. "Thank you."
"Don't be so silly." Leofric said, though he patted Wulfstan's back and didn't pull away. Rarely did the man ever reject Wulfstan's touch, even encouraging it at times, so it was no surprise that he leant heavily into the tall body wrapping about him. He inhaled deeply before resting his head against the other man's shoulder. "We can dry as many flowers as you want. I'll pick more whenever you'd like more."
Though he didn't say anything back, Wulfstan grinned wide, and pressed himself closer to Leofric. Joyous, apprehensive, maybe, his thoughts flew back to the idea of the clumsy romancing and the ladies with their sweetheart's wildflower bouquets. It invigorated him, making him want to sweep Leofric off his feet. He made sure that he was gentle, cautious, as always, to not hurt the man, but Wulfstan couldn't help but squeeze his arms tight around Leofric.
Much as he often did, Wulfstan hoped that they could stay like this for a long, long time.