Brookheart and the Forest's Sad Song cover art

Brookheart and the Forest's Sad Song

Brookheart and the Forest's Sad Song

Listen for free

View show details

About this listen

The forest is humming again, but this time the hum is soft and sad. Brookheart, a gentle creature with delicate wings, feels it first as a vibration. While her friends play near the Singing Stream, her heart tugs her somewhere else.

Something needs me, she thinks, and follows that feeling like a thread through a maze.

The path grows quieter with each flutter of her wings. Silver-leafed trees stand closer together. Moonlight barely touches the ground. The soft glow that usually wraps around the forest is fading, growing dimmer like a candle someone almost forgot to light.

In the center of the quiet, shadowed place, Brookheart discovers the loneliest thing: an ancient tree so old its trunk is wider than ten friends standing together. Its silver leaves hang like sad tears. Its branches droop toward the ground, too tired to reach for the sky anymore.

The heartbeat of the forest—that warm, invisible magic—is coming from this tree. And it's crying.

Doubt whispers: You're so small. Can you really help something so old and big? But Brookheart has learned: the smallest acts of kindness can grow into the biggest magic of all.

"I'm here," she tells the tree softly. "You're not forgotten anymore. I see you."

The tree's branches shudder. The sadness grows bigger—but this time it's the kind that comes before healing, like finally telling someone how much something hurt.

Brookheart realizes she needs help. So she flies back to get her friends—Clover the wise rabbit, Russet the cheerful fox, and three giggling hedgehogs. Together, they journey to the forgotten tree.

They arrange themselves around its trunk. Clover touches the bark with her nose. Russet leans against the roots. The hedgehogs curl in the moss like a pile of love. And Brookheart places her tiny hand on the ancient bark:

"You are not alone. You are not forgotten. You are part of our woodland family. Your roots keep us safe. Your branches shelter us. Your age makes you wise, and your loneliness makes you gentle. We see you. We love you. We always will."

The forest grows warm. The invisible heartbeat spreads outward like ripples in a puddle. Silver leaves begin to glow. Branches reach up, remembering how to hope.

Wildflowers push through the moss—one, then two, then dozens—until a circle of color blooms where only shadow had been. Butterflies dance among new flowers. The forgotten corner wakes up and remembers it's alive.

Perfect for ages 5-8, this gentle story teaches children about:

  • Noticing when something or someone needs comfort
  • Being brave even when you feel too small to help
  • Asking friends to help with big feelings or big tasks
  • Showing love to lonely or forgotten things
  • The power of simply saying "I see you"
  • Smallest acts of kindness creating biggest magic

A soft, glowing tale about a gentle creature learning that you don't have to be big to comfort something hurting—you just have to be brave enough to say "You're not alone," and kind enough to bring your friends to help.

Runtime: 8:50

Part of the Fables Adventures collection - audio stories that wrap young listeners in the warm truth that even when you feel small and uncertain, your kindness can wake up forgotten corners of the world and make them bloom again.

To read the full text of this story, visit us at Fable's Adventures

✨ Want to create your own stories? Download the Fable’sAdventures app for iOS

No reviews yet
In the spirit of reconciliation, Audible acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.