Woodheart and the Moss Mice

More about Woodheart and the Moss Mice

Deep in the Whispering Wood, where the trees whisper stories to each other and the moss never stops growing, a small wooden figure sat on a stone bench. Its skin was made of weathered pieces of bark, its limbs were crisscrossed with annual rings, and on its head grew a wreath of wild leaves and tiny flowers, with two delicate twigs sticking out of its hair like antennae. Everyone called it Woodheart. It rarely spoke. But those who listened closely could sense that it was listening to a language others had long forgotten: the buzzing of beetles, the cracking of mushrooms, the whispering of stones. That morning, the forest was shrouded in a soft mist, and Woodheart sat, as she did every day, on her bench made of mushroom stone and moss, her chin resting in her hands, her feet bare on the soft ground. Six tiny figures had gathered before her—moss mice, no bigger than acorns, with round bellies and shiny, button eyes. One wore a tiny leaf like a cloak, another proudly held a seed like a treasure. "And then?" squeaked the smallest mouse, standing on its hind legs. Woodheart smiled with her eyes. She never spoke aloud, but the moss mice understood her anyway. Perhaps it was the wind that carried her thoughts, or the warmth radiating from her silent heart. "Then the day came when the great heart of the forest stopped ticking," she said, without moving her mouth. The moss mice moved closer. "It wasn't sick, not sad, not lost. Just... silent. Like a song no one sings anymore." The moss mice were shocked and silent. They didn't know the heart of the forest—they were too small, too young. But Woodheart did. She was carved from it, many winters ago, from a branch that once belonged to the Heart Tree. And ever since, she had been the guardian of the forgotten. "What happened to the Heart?" asked the mouse with the leaf cloak. "It was heard—and then forgotten. No one asked about its dreams anymore. No one laid an ear to its bark anymore. And so it fell asleep." A rustling went through the moss mice. "Can we wake it?" Woodheart looked into her sparkling eyes. It had been a long time since anyone had asked. "Perhaps," she said. "If you give it something." "What?" whispered the youngest. Woodheart lowered her gaze. "Something small. Something real. Something only you have." The moss mice scurried away. They searched all day: a drop of morning dew, the last note of a bird's call, a piece of light filtering through a leaf. In the evening, they returned—with tiny treasures, in their paws, in their hearts. Woodheart accepted the offerings. Something began to glow in her chest—a faint ticking, barely audible, but there. That night, the trees sang again. And deep beneath the earth, where roots tell stories, the heart of the forest opened its amber eye—and remembered.