The Purple Fever burned out after another several days. The final death toll stayed below fifty, and everyone else at the Leader’s Lodge successfully recovered with minimal to no long term complications. Accounting for nearly half of the death toll, the Bear Tribe council of elders took the biggest hit with twenty-one of its fifty members dead. Fortunately, none of the exchange trainees were killed, but the epidemic took a psychological toll on everyone-- none more than Huo Lohse.

After nearly a week of spotty sleep and high stress, Lolo was left feeling empty, short-tempered, and withdrawn. As a defense mechanism to get through the ordeal, she had completely shut down. While the rest of the lodge returned to normal life as best they could, Huo Lohse spent several days voluntarily isolated in her room, only eating what others thought to bring her. Most of the time, she slept and stared blankly into space. No one could get through to her, but because boys weren’t allowed in the right, north corridor, most of the people at the Leader’s Lodge who cared about her couldn’t even try.

“Lolo,” Shanti tried for the millionth time that week, “your brothers have been asking about you.”

“They are worried sick, Lolo. Let’s go talk to them,” Et’zana added.

Lolo, who was contemplating a large knot in a thick beam on the ceiling, shook her head almost undetectably.

“Standig wrote you a note. Do you want to read it?” Shanti asked.

“Not now.”

“I’ll leave it on your dresser for later then,” Shanti said, adding to a pile of unopened letters. “Um, are you hungry? It’s almost lunch time.”

“No.”

Shanti turned to Et’zana and shrugged helplessly. Et’zana shrugged back and said, “I guess we will just bring you something back then.”

The two girls left, and Lolo rolled over and fell asleep again.

The Lang boys, Standig, and Philige met up after sparring practice later that day to try to figure out what to do about Lolo.

“There’s only, what, a week and half left in the exchange?” Rensui asked.

“Normally, Lolo would be finding ways to make the most of this time with her friends,” Haowan said.

“No word from her at all still?” Philige looked worried.

Qingchi shook his head. “Jadu believes she is suffering from acute depression.”

“What can we do to help her if she won’t read our notes or leave her room, and we can’t go to see her?” Zizai was feeling more frustrated than anything. “Maybe she wants to be left alone.”

“No, Lolo has never wanted to be alone. We should keep trying. Even if she never reads our letters, at least she knows that we are still thinking about her when she gets them,” Qingchi advised.

“Standig, you’ve been awfully quiet. Do you have any ideas?” Zhongyan turned to the brooding bear.

Standig was sitting outside the circle of boys just listening to the conversation. He did have an idea, but it was risky. “I was thinking that maybe someone should try sneaking into the girls’ corridor.” Everyone stared at him. “I mean, Lolo’s refusing to leave her room, not eating, not communicating. What options do we have, really? A few weeks ago, isolation was literally torture for her. Now, she’s cutting herself off from everyone on her own. Something’s gotta be up.”

“I’ll do it,” Qingchi volunteered. “I’m the oldest.”

“By three minutes,” Rensui rolled his eyes.

“Still, I should be the one to take responsibility,” Qingchi said, giving his twin an annoyed look.

The rest of the Lang boys were quick to protest and give reasons why they felt that they should be the one to break into their sister’s room. Standig and Philige looked at each other, communicating silently while Lolo’s brothers argued.

“I think,” Philige started and waited for the boys to hush, “I think maybe I should be the one to go. Lolo won’t shut me out as easily because I’m less familiar than the rest of you, and I stand a better chance of being successful. I know the terrain better, and I have the advantage of outranking just about anyone I might run into.”

The group collectively pondered Philige’s proposal and eventually agreed to it.

“You should go after nightfall,” Standig suggested, “and we should warn Et’zana to expect you.”

“I’ll talk to her,” Zhongyan offered.

Philige nodded. “Tell her to expect me after curfew tonight.”

Under cover of darkness, Philige worked his way through the stilts holding the deck of the girls-only aisle up. Coming to the end of the corridor, Philige climbed up a notched stilt leg designed as a fire escape route. First peeking onto the deck to confirm that the coast was clear, Philige hoisted himself over the railing and knocked on the door of the nearest cabin. Et’zana was waiting for him and immediately opened the door, ushering him in quickly to shield him from unfriendly eyes. At six feet and four inches, Philige had to duck to get through the short doorframe.

“You made it,” Et’zana whispered then looked in her roommate’s direction.

Philige followed her gaze. Lolo was curled up on the bed with her face to the wall. “Is she asleep?”

“I think so.”

He walked over to Lolo’s bed and sat down on the edge to nudge her awake. “Lolo?”

Huo Lohse rolled over to her other side, still half-asleep, and startled to see Philige sitting in front of her through her slumber-blurred eyes. She sat up so fast that she got a head-rush. “Philige? What are you doing here?”

“I came to talk to you.”

“You’re not allowed to be here! You should go.”

“I’ll only go if you promise to meet me tomorrow morning for breakfast.”

Lolo was not prepared to make that kind of promise, but she also didn’t want to be responsible if Philige got into trouble again. “I, uh, I don’t want to go to breakfast,” she mumbled, avoiding eye contact.

“If not breakfast, than meet me in the garden tomorrow morning where you showed me how to get notes to Standig.”

She considered his counterproposal and decided that it had the potential to be a reasonable compromise. “Just you?”

“Just me.”

“What time?”

“Seven, while everyone else is at breakfast.”

At least this way, she wouldn’t have to see or talk to anyone else. “Fine.”

Satisfied, Philige smiled and left, ducking as he passed through the doorway.

Lolo didn’t sleep well that night, so when the morning light peaked through her window, she still felt very tired. She dragged herself out of bed and washed up for the first time since the quarantine had been lifted. Her training clothes were all dirty which meant that she had to wear one of the dresses her mom had sent. The first dress she saw was the red one, so that’s the one she put on. Not really up to doing much with her hair and makeup, Lolo simply brushed her hair out while it air-dried and put on just enough makeup for people to know that she was wearing any.

Et’zana woke up as Lolo was putting shoes on to walk out the door. “You look so nice!”

“Huh?” Lolo had been lost in thought.

“I said, you look so nice!” Et’zana laughed her tinkling laugh.

“Oh. My training clothes are dirty.”

“Well, you look so much better today than I’ve seen you the last couple of weeks.”

Lolo tried to smile, but only managed a half smile. “I need to go.”

“Why? It’s not even six thirty.”

Lolo walked out the door without answering. The truth was that she simply didn’t want to see any more people than was absolutely necessary. After the illness, people had started treating her like some sort of hero, but she didn’t feel like a hero at all. Forty-eight people had died-- thirty-three of them under her watch. And she didn’t want to talk about it. She didn’t want to answer questions or explain her feelings. She didn’t want to go to class where Tadellos Tragen had resumed teaching after Abgriffen died. She didn’t want to face her friends and admit how terrified she had been watching each of them get sick and deteriorate before pulling through and recovering. Right now, everyone still had bruises in varying shades and stages of fading, and she didn’t want the reminder. It was much easier to continue the numbness than it was to face her feelings.

It was another misty mountain morning. Lolo arrived at the predetermined meeting spot at six-thirty sharp and found blades of grass to manipulate mindlessly while she waited for Philige. She twisted the grasses around her fingers and watched the blood trapped by the constriction change her skin colors. She ripped the blades into miniscule pieces. She shredded them vertically along the veins in the blades. She twisted and knotted them together to form a sort of rope.

Philige arrived a few minutes before seven. “You’re early!”

“Hi.”

Philige extended his hand to her to help her up. “Let’s go for a walk.”

Huo Lohse followed Philige in the mist, through the garden northward to the very edge of the Leader’s Lodge borders, and then due east. Philige seemed to sense that she wasn’t up for conversation, so they walked in a comfortable silence. He led her through some wilderness, past a greenhouse, and through a small stone wall, into an overgrown apple orchard. The orchard was old and neglected. The trees hadn’t been pruned for several seasons, and the wall was covered with vines of ivy and floral crawlers.

“Philige, where are you taking me?” Lolo was the first to break the silence.

He skirted the question slightly. “This orchard has been left abandoned. I think it may have been forgotten; at any rate, no one comes here. I discovered it a few years ago, and I like to come here to think because I’m never interrupted.” He followed a narrow path through the trees to a small corner shaded by a single, over-sized apple tree. The stone wall here had toppled partially, creating a U-shape where rivers of flowering vines cascaded through. The ground directly under the tree sloped gently down, away from the tree and was covered in a soft, dry moss and clover as Philige had cleared the space of other weeds, vines, and aggressive grasses. It was beautiful and relaxing in a quirky, wild way. “Welcome to my sanctuary.”

Lolo looked around. The more she looked, the more there was to see through the thinning mist. There was a bird’s nest in the apple tree high above them and a collection of small green spheres, developing into a crop of autumn fruit, dangling from the branches. Buried under a pile of vines near the wall sat a small stone bench, intricately carved and weather-worn with room to seat two people comfortably. A little deeper into the orchard was a tree with a small swing hanging from a high branch. The board of the swing was rotten and housed a collection of small mushrooms. A long dried out fountain sat on the edge of a narrow, paved path. The bricks of the path were chipped and cracked and had become uneven as tree roots had grown underneath them, pushing them upward….

Philige sat on the mossy ground and patted the space next to him to encourage her to join him. She sat, continuing to look around.

“Why did you bring me here?” Lolo turned to face Philige.

“To clear your head,” came the answer.

“Oh.”

They sat in silence for a long while. The sun was now high enough to impart a warm glow and some heat, and Lolo stretched out on the ground with her hands behind her head to absorb the filtered light.

“Lolo, I’m guessing you don’t want to talk about it?”

“I don’t.”

“Can’t say that I blame you.” Philige pulled his knees up to his chest, wrapping his arms around his legs and leaning forward to rest his chin on his knees. “Have you been able to cry about it?”

His question surprised her, and she sat up to look at him. “Why do you ask?”

“I just know that sometimes when bad things happen, it can leave you feeling sort of messed-up on the inside. I’ve always found that a good cry helps sort things out.”

Lolo was impressed that he’d admit to that. Her brothers seemed to think that crying wasn’t manly and always hid their tears. “I haven’t… been able to cry, that is.”

“That’s a shame. I think it would help you a lot.”

“I honestly don’t feel like crying, though. I just feel empty.”

Philige considered her response for a while. “Lolo, I know you don’t want to talk about it,” he hesitated, “but I don’t think you’ll be able to move on unless you do.”

As he said it, she knew that he was right. “Are you offering an ear?”

“Two, actually,” he grinned at her.

After a deep breath and a moment of thought, Lolo decided to try taking Philige’s advice. “Nothing prepared me for that, you know? Watching people die slowly, watching my friends and brothers all get sick, feeling helpless and yet having so much to do to try and help everyone…. Just, nothing prepared me for that.

“And I was so scared the whole time. I’m no hero, Philige. I didn’t have time to feel sad when I lost someone or feel tired, even when I was passing-out. I was just scared. That fear was actually what kept me going. I’m not proud of that, but it did serve a purpose, I guess.

“You know the worst thing, though? I don’t even know their names… the people that died, I mean. I don’t know who they were, who they left behind, if anyone, what kinds of people they were. Nothing. They were all just another patient, another body taking up a bed. And at some point, I stopped thinking about them as people.” She choked on a forming lump in her throat.

“People keep thanking me, but they don't even realize that, to me, they were just another patient to treat. Just a number. And, had they died, I’d have had Haleit find people to clear their bed to make room for someone else.” The tears welled up.

“But they were people! All of them! They left behind families that can never be the same now. I just wish that I could have done more for them.” The tears were now spilling down her face, and she started sobbing.

Philige wrapped an arm over her shoulders and continued to listen quietly, letting her cry as hard and as long as she needed. Lolo ended up crying herself to sleep against his shoulder, and Philige helped her lie down onto the soft ground while he busied himself with maintenance tasks around the orchard.

A couple of hours later, Huo Lohse woke up with clover indents and pieces of moss stuck on her face.

“Are you feeling better now?” Philige asked.

She sat up, brushing the moss off her forehead, and thought for a moment. “I think so.”

Without another word, he moved to help pull her up. “It’s time then.”

“Time for what?”

“To talk to your brothers. They are really worried about you.”

“I know,” Lolo said, hanging her head.

“I think they’ll understand, but they will want to see for themselves that you are ok.”

“Can we stay just a little longer? I’m not ready yet, and I can help you in the orchard for a little while.”

Philige agreed, and the pair worked together clearing out weeds and cutting back vines.

“Philige, how do you know how to garden?”

“Some of it’s common sense. Some of it is just guessing. And some of it, I asked one of the lodge farmers about. You seem to know what you are doing though.”

“I once did an independent study on agriculture.”

“A what?”

“We had a history lesson about a great famine in the Wolf Tribe. My great-grandmother was the Alpha then. The famine was ended by adopting some clever farming techniques that optimized the land and water resources. I was curious about what that entailed, so I studied some of those techniques by interviewing and shadowing a series of farmers for a summer. I learned a lot of the basics, and then I learned about things like ideal crop rotations, how to build an aqueduct, fertilization methods, how to attract pollinators, and what are the right kinds of soils for different crops.”

Philige stopped yanking on the vines he was doing battle with to look at her. “You spent a summer just learning about farming?” He seemed impressed.

“Well, I was also taking care of Xiao Shen at the time. You remember my baobe, right?”

“Mn.”

“Yeah, so it was the summer after I turned ten and Xiao Shen turned one that summer. His parents and grandparents are farmers. I didn’t think much about farming until that summer, but I was spending so much time with farmers anyway that it was easy to investigate my curiosity when it arose. I figured that the skillset might come in handy someday too, you know?”

“Makes sense. Did you learn anything about apple orchards?”

Lolo laughed for the first time since the epidemic. “Not specifically, but I did learn some pruning basics. Are you wanting more to shape the trees here to look pretty, or are you hoping to encourage more fruit bearing?”

“I guess, both?”

“That’s doable. Generally, pruning encourages more fruiting, but if you also want the trees to act as shade trees, you might choose which branches to keep and which ones to leave a bit differently. The time to prune your trees is in the late autumn after the leaves fall off. It’s easier to see what you are doing then, and it’s better for the tree because that’s when it goes dormant. I wrote a report on how to properly prune a fruit tree. When I get home, I’ll find it to send you a copy.”

“I’d like that. Thanks!” Philige looked up at the sky. The sun was now in the west. “Hey, Lolo, it has to be approaching dinner time now, and I don’t know about you, but I could stand to wash up first.”

She nodded, looking at the dirt on her hands. “I guess we’d better head back.”

Philige started toward the exit and Lolo moved to follow him.

“Philige,” he turned to look at her, “thank you for today.”

He gave her that warm smile of his. “I don’t know that you will ever find yourself in the Bear Tribe again, but if you do, you would be welcome to come back here any time.”

After her outing with Philige getting sweaty digging in the dirt, Huo Lohse was filthy but feeling infinitely better. Philige dropped her off just north of her cabin and showed her where the notched stilt was to climb up for easier access. She washed up quickly for dinner and ended up bumping into Philige again as they were both heading to the pavillion for dinner.

“Fancy meeting you here,” she teased.

“Yeah, long time, no see,” he teased back.

Lolo’s brothers had been waiting to hear from Philige all day about how his meeting with her had gone, so when Philige arrived at the pavillion, the boys pounced on him before realizing that Lolo was standing right there with him.

“Philige, there you are!”

“How did it go? Did you see her?”

“How is she doing?”

Lolo pulled on Qingchi’s sleeve and was met with a, “not now, Lolo…. Lolo?!”

The Lang boys seemed stunned momentarily then crowded around their sister to give her a hug and pepper her with questions.

“Where have you been? We missed you.”

“Why did you lock yourself in your room?”

“Are you feeling alright? You’re not sick, are you?”

“We’ve been so worried!”

Her brothers weren’t the only ones eager to see her. Most of the trainees got up to take turns welcoming her back or giving her a hug. It was all a little overwhelming. Standig waited for his friend to get through the gauntlet of people and saved her the seat next to him instead of joining the fray. Lolo was glad to finally sit down at the table to eat something.

“It’s good to see you, Lolo,” Standig said in his usual fashion.

“It’s good to see you, too,” Lolo said, and she meant it.

“Mind if I sit here?” Philige asked, pointing to the seat on the other side of her.

“Please, do,” Lolo said with a smile.

The table quickly filled up and a second table was pushed end-to-end with it to accommodate the rest of the trainees. They threw caution to the wind and decided to enjoy their first evening with Huo Lohse back. They chatted merrily with each other, cracking jokes, laughing, and filling Lolo in on the latest news and lessons. When dinner was over, everyone was reluctant to head back to their own rooms. They left together in a small crowd, walking the decks back to the two north corridors. All of their rooms except Philige’s were in the two north aisles, but Philige was heading in the same direction to The Great Hall.

The council of elders was assembling at The Great Hall for their standard evening meeting as the trainees passed by. This particular meeting was unusually large as the council had summoned elders from all around the greater Bear Tribe to fill the seats left vacant by the Purple Fever outbreak. A few of the elders, still marked with bruises, spotted the trainees and waved them over.

“Which of you are Huo Lohse Lang, Haleit Ryetlatur, and Shanti Bhuje?”

The three of them stepped forward and bowed to the elders. The elders smiled at them and bowed back. “We would like to thank you for your care,” said a tall, wispy elder Lolo recognized as one of the first patients she had treated.

“We are all grateful,” added another elder.

“Our investigation into the epidemic showed that it was started when a merchant came to the lodge looking for the physician to treat an outbreak at the trading post. It seems that the post was similarly ravaged by Purple Fever, and our physician died from complications of the illness himself.”

“We are looking for qualified people to fill the position of lodge physician,” said a relatively shorter but very stocky elder. He turned to the Bhuje siblings. “I understand that you young dragons were medically trained in Pahaad. Perhaps one of you would be interested?”

Shanti laughed pleasantly. “I’m only a third year here at the exchange, but I’m honored that you would consider me.”

“And what about your brother? I’m sure he is also qualified.” The elder turned to look at Jadu.

Jadu bowed. “Sorry, but I have plans.”

The elders weren’t surprised that Jadu declined. The tall, wispy elder smiled at the Bhujes. “If you ever change your mind, we’d be fools not to take you.”

Shanti and Jadu bowed to the elders.

“We’ll take our leave.” The elders turned to file into The Great Hall.

Philige excused himself to attend the meeting too, and the group of trainees resumed the walk around the deck to their rooms.

“Well, good-night everyone,” Lolo said as the north rows came into view.

There was a staggered sound-off of “good-night” through the pack of trainees, and people started to break off to head to bed. Before Lolo could peel away, Standig snagged her wrist and pulled her to the side. Soon, they were the only ones left.

“What’s up, Standig?”

Standig wrapped her in a strong hug. “You really scared me, Lolo. Don’t hide away like that again.”

Lolo hugged her friend back. “Ok.” After a few moments, Standig released her and she added, “I’ll see you in class tomorrow,” before she left to turn in for the night.

As Standig turned toward his cabin, he caught a flash of movement next to The Great Hall. “Uncle?” His stomach lurched like someone had dropped the floor out from underneath him.

Tadellos looked positively deranged. “Standig, stay away from that girl! You never learn.”

“Uncle, she-”

“She is ruining you, Standig! I could tell from the very first letter she wrote.”

Standig felt like he’d just been slapped. “Her letters? You've read her letters?! You kept them from me?!”

“I did it for your own good, Standig.” Tadellos was seething.

“What do you know about what’s good for me?” It had been a long time since Standig had talked back to his uncle, but tonight, a dam of repressed hurt seemed to break, and he couldn’t stop himself.

“I raised you, Standig!”

“Did you?! I’ve spent most of my life locked away in my room or finding places to hide from you! I’ve never had friends beyond my own brother, and you even tried to prevent that! Now, I finally have someone in my life that cares about me, the true me, and you want nothing more than to get rid of her!”

“Standig!” Tadellos warned.

“No! You’ve gone too far. This summer you locked me up to keep me away from her, you locked her up to torture her, you bullied her and her family, ignored everything she did for this tribe, and you still haven’t had enough!”

“Huo Loh-”

“Huo Lohse Lang is a good person, uncle! She’s kind and caring. I trust her with my life.”

“Stan-”

“SHE'S MY BEST FRIEND!” Standig was shouting. “You can’t force me to give her up!”

Tadellos threw a hard punch that broke Standig’s nose and knocked him to the ground. Standig hit the wood deck with a crash, seeing stars, his nose gushing. Tadellos seemed to have completely lost his mind as he started to unwrap his braided leather belt. “This time, I’ll teach you a lesson you won’t forget.”