3. The Tree of Life
A beautiful rosy fox tapped her nose against Donte. “Hmpf. Dinosaur. I should have known.”
“Sorry, Miss Fox,” Donte mumbled.
Mami nudged him and hissed: “This is the goddess Feria!”
The fox smiled. She gently picked up Mami between her teeth and lifted her onto her back. “The dinosaurs have been avoiding the gods for years. No wonder their children have forgotten we exist.”
She walked away. For every one of Donte’s steps, she had to take twenty. But Feria did not feel afraid or small, just irritated.
In the middle of the water stood a thick tree reaching for the sun. As soon as they stood in the shade, Feria walked into the water—but her paws did not sink further. A bridge of starfish made a solid path to the opening in the tree.
“Are you going to explain yourself?” Feria asked when they were almost there. “Or do you dinosaurs consider yourselves too good to even talk to a goddess?”
“No, it’s not that. I was banished by my kind. I don’t know the feeling that goes with it.”
Feria froze and looked at him. “Banished? Then you must be the cruelest dinosaur ever to have lived. Normally they just eat you right away if you make them angry.”
She walked inside. The tree was not hollowed out, cut and chopped into a house as humans would do, but grew naturally around Feria’s cozy little cottage. She had a few rooms with soft carpets, plants, insects, and small animals. Besides that, she relinquished all control and let nature do its thing.
As such, large Donte had to stay outside.
Feria put Mami on one of the carpets and took her paw. “I can’t make any promises, but …”
She gently kneaded the muscles in the paw. Mami’s hind leg glowed. More and more she pulled her own fox fingers away, until she gave a little kiss and the glow immediately disappeared, as if it was sucked up by the wound in the leg.
“Thank you, Feria,” said Mami, as she stretched her leg to see if it worked again. It did, like new.
“Not to be rude or anything,” Donte called from outside. Which, instead the tree, sounded as if Mother Earth herself was talking to you. “But I have a question about an asteroid that might or might not be coming for us?”
“I don’t control that. You’ll have to ask Cosmo or Darus.”
“How many animals does asteroid have to kill before it becomes your problem?”
Feria flashed outside and nearly slapped Donte in the face with her tail. “You are not welcome here or with the other gods.”
Donte sighed. “If you convince asteroid, uh, is coming for dinosaurs, they’ll let me back. No more trouble from me.”
Mami hesitated. He had saved her, multiple times now, and had been kind. But the world would only be better off if those awful beasts disappeared.
Feria climbed upwards. “This is the Tree of Life. It is my throne, the very first tree on this planet, which I planted together with my sister Eeris. The more balanced life is, the bigger and greener my throne grows.”
She traveled along a thin branch like a tightrope walker and pointed her tail backwards. Mami leaned against Donte’s hind leg and saw what she meant.
It was as if someone had taken a bite out of the tree. Branches were splintered, leaves misshapen and withered. Outside that black stain, dark streaks radiated in all directions, like poisoned rivers through the rest of the Tree of Life.
No, someone really DID take a bite out of the tree. And that sickness is now spreading through the rest of the Tree of Life.
“Your … kind has been a nuisance for years around the Mouth of Din. Then you spread to the Saursea. And now you’re coming here, the last place where Small Ones can still live.”
“That’s normal,” Donte objected. “We just big. So many animals are meat-eaters. Those Gosti are everywhere too, right?”
“Yes, but a Gosti eats one plant stem per day and is tiny as my paw. If I wasn’t immortal—because, you know, I’m a goddess and the being who created you—I would have been eaten by one of you long ago.”
Feria landed gracefully next to Mami. “The gods are not going to help you. We’re more likely to do the opposite.”
Donte lowered his head. “Okay, I understand,” he mumbled, and he sauntered away over the starfish path.
“He … he’s not like the other dinosaurs,” Mami said carefully. Feria only shook her fur. But he almost crushed me too.
When he was back on the beach, Feria did run after him.
“It gives me no pleasure, believe me. I am the goddess of animals, I want nothing more than to give everyone a good life.”
She placed a little kiss on Donte’s drooping forehead. “But understand that your lives wipe out so many other lives. Please, stay away from here.”
Mami waved goodbye. Donte didn’t see it anymore.
When Feria stood side by side with her, she whistled a high melody. Mami didn’t know an animal could produce so much volume, but at the same time it didn’t hurt her ears. It was beautiful and fitting, as if she had heard the melody many times before.
“You trust Donte? You say he is good?”
“I don’t know that. But I’m the reason he was outlawed. He’s not the cruelest; he’s the kindest.”
Feria looked at her closely. “Then I believe you.”
Suddenly she ran off. Mami could barely keep up, but certainly didn’t want to lose sight of a goddess.
“Very nice, yes, sure. But why do you believe me, and not Donte?”
“The Gosti are the most intelligent creatures I ever made. They are pure wisdom.”
“Oh, well, thank you—” Mami bumped her head on a branch. Feria effortlessly ran up the tree sideways, pulling Mami along, and they continued their way above the treetops and branches.
Below them two dinosaurs stomped by, one purple and the other yellow. Both their noses held a large horn, which didn’t seem so threatening now. This is much smarter! They can’t crush you if you’re above them!
But Mami wasn’t used to this. She couldn’t swing from branches, barely had a tail, and also discovered she was terribly afraid of heights. She soon had to allow Feria to pick her up again.
“Why the hurry?”
“We’ve known about the asteroid for a long time. It’s almost here. And my family plans to do nothing and let it through.”