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Wind! "she cried, " please come and blow the water away, my child is drowning!"
"No time!" answered the wind from very far, "no time today, sorry!" The mother called many days, but nobody seemed to hear her while Birkina became weaker and sicker and lay helpless on the ground. Then it snowed and under the soft white cover she found a little warmth. But the water around her was now frozen and squeezed her like a big fist. "I don't want to die, Mummy," she whispered, "I don't want to die" her mother could not answer, the tears choked her.

But, listen, what was that?
There was a noise, a very loud noise, something Birkina had never heard before. Children were running to the river bank, playing and throwing snow at each other.
Oh, God! Birkina thought, are they big! "People," the other trees said to each other,"people, beware of people!"
The ground shook and trembled under their feet. Birkina wished she could become even smaller. "I hope they don't see me," she thought, just as a little girl's hand grabbed some snow to make a snowball, her foot broke into the icy water around the sapling and hovered very close above Birkinas head and body.
"Help, help, stop, don't squash me, don't tread on me, I'm right under the snow, hatshi, I'm a tree!" The little girl lifted her foot and stood still before she lost her balance and fell, her face right next to the little sick Beech. She forgot her wet feet and put her ear to the ground, her hands carefully brushing away the snow to reveal the tiny tree.

"What did you say?" she asked, thinking she was in a dream. Birkina begged her again to spare her life. "How did you get such a cold?"the girl asked and listened carefully to Birkina's story. Then she called her friends and they discussed how to help the little tree. Finally they decided to dig a trench to lead the water back into the river and raise the earth around the sapling, so she would stand at the same level as her mother. One boy carefully broke the remaining ice around the tree with a stone and when the trench was finished the water ran away as fast as it could.
"Thank you!" it gurgled,"thank you for freeing me, I don't like being trapped! I didn't want to drown the little princess here, believe me!"
"Ok," Birkina said relieved, her voice already a bit stronger, "Thank you, too and have a good journey!"
The children now stood in front of Birkina and looked at her sympathetically. The sapling was still lying on the ground, weak, coughing, sneezing and shivering with cold. "Poor thing," they said, "we must keep her warm!" Seven eager hands gathered some spruce leaves from the woods nearby and laid them like a thick shawl around and over the tiny tree after they had straightened her stem. Then they shoved a big heap of snow around the sapling and covered her completely. "Good night!" said the children tenderly, " stay warm so that you can grow big and strong next year!"
"How can I ever thank you, humans?!"said the mother Beech with tears in her eyes, but nobody heard her
Birkina quickly felt warm and safe under her snow cap and soon fell asleep until the first sunrays of spring melted the snow and woke her up. The children came to see her regularly, watched her grow, gave her water in the dry days of summer and covered her with snow in the winter while she became stronger and taller every year. Unlike the children Birkina never again had a cold.

Learn more about this author, Sybille Krivenko.
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