Chapter 1

Won't you tell your dreams to me, fantasy will set you free.

Magic Carpet Ride-Steppenwolf

While reclining back against the tree, Brenda decided to wait forty-five minutes before she entered the trail. This would assure that the trail would be clear and open for her. Brenda reflected back to a hike that she had made last summer, from this same lot, which had birthed the seed of her endeavor for today.

The late July day of that hike, had been very hot and her car had been the only vehicle in the parking lot. It had been an arid summer and the streams along the trail-way had dwindled to mere trickles. Brenda had climbed several hundred yards on a twenty- percent incline and was totally drenched with sweat. The woods were tinder-dry and the heat was in the chalky high nineties. Her light blouse's shirttails were knotted up at the sternum, to allow any cool breeze to refresh her tight tummy. Its mauve linen fabric was marbled along the neckline with rich embroideries of trees and ferns. Brenda's bra lay back in her car on the rearseat floor because it was too restraining and would chafe her skin on the trek. The lack of restraint caused Brenda's ample bosoms to slide across her perspiration slickened torso with each climbing step. As a rugged compliment to her attire, she wore a high cut pair of cut-off denim shorts. Brenda's heart held a song inside, because in this weather, the entire mountainside belonged to her alone. Everyone else with free time would be at their favorite watering hole and trying to gain relief from the heat. The cicadas filled the treetops with their pulsating chorus, and all else was still.

Brenda was less than two miles from the trailhead. A wooden bridge spanned a small gurgling brook, and it was there that she stopped to relax. The stream had shrunken from its banks in a mute testimony to the summer's wrath. Gazing idly at its flowing remnant, Brenda asked herself, where does this water come from? Perhaps it is issued out by a bubbling spring. But no, there was a dried streambed five feet in width, a pond or a small lake must feed this.

The upstream side of the path reared to a hillock crested with a stand of Pines and sparsely quilled with White Birches along most of its incline. It rose only forty feet above where she now stood, yet it hid the horizon and promised a whole New World beyond its ridge. Brenda's intuition told her that if she ascended the rise, she would then be treated to a view of a secret lake. Maybe even a quick and bracing skinny dip would be her reward.

The first ten feet from the path was the toughest, because the path was walled with willowy bushes which were mingled with brambles. Slowly and nimbly she wove her way through the maze of bushes which sprung from a rich grassy carpet. As she emerged from the far side, Brenda stopped to admire the jutting Birches. The woman had always had an inexplicable fascination with large trees. The larger and older they appeared, the keener the attraction she felt. What histories they had seen and what mysteries they could share were the questions Brenda would daydream upon, whenever she discovered an unusually large or old specimen.

Methodically wending her course up the hillside, the lady stopped occasionally to lightly touch the fragile bark of a Birch. The final fifteen feet to the summit was carpeted with Pine needles, and as she entered their cathedral-like grove, she could see shards of dead and naked timber lacing the skyline ahead. This was a sure indication that a long-standing woodland pond was there. The ridge was twenty yards wide, and it wasn't until she had almost crossed it, that she realized the pond had dried up. From the hilltop, Brenda could see a small trickle of a creek as it wound its way through the dusty and leaf-matted two-acre basin that she thought should be holding water. Heat waves shimmered along its barren expanse.

Brenda decided to descend the slope and investigate it further anyway. Traveling downhill, and being careful not to lose her footing, she stopped two thirds of the way to the bottom and used what altitude she had remaining to survey the terrain. To the right of her, the basin sprawled out as a large flat expanse. It was punctuated every thirty yards by the skeletal trunks of ashen and dead trees rearing up from their parched graves. Some retained a few of their branch limbs. Others had small living bushes accenting their bases, so that they appeared to be phallic in nature, with green mounds of pubic hair encompassing their rising shafts.

Turning left, Brenda saw that the forest on three sides cradled a small cove to the main pond bottom. She exhaled a small jet of air between parted teeth in surprise. The bay in itself was not remarkable. Drawing her attention and central to the lagoon, was the largest specimen of a Swamp Maple that she had ever seen.

Among all trees, Swamp Maples were her favorites. In appearance, their trunks were like an intertwining of fig trees, joining into a "Geigerain" braid, and looking akin to a pumped up school of eels on steroids. As Swamp Maples went, the tree rising before her was a mammoth plant. The largest tree of this species that Brenda had ever observed, had been three feet in diameter. This monster appeared to be more than twice that size. A thin belt of Mountain Laurel on all sides obscured the shoreline of the pond's bottom.

Weaving her way through the Laurel bushes, she made her way toward the cove's shore. A grassy knoll of a clearing opened up to the lagoon and Brenda eased herself down to sit in the cool grass. She unlaced her low-cut hiking boots and kicked them off. Her feet seemed to be sizzling hot, so for further relief Brenda removed her socks and draped them across her boots.

A light breeze wafted through the woods. It played its way through her hair and caused the blades of grass to caress her bare legs. Brenda was entranced with the mighty visage of the immense Swamp Maple, as she slowly slid off her daypack and sought out her camera. She also removed one of the two canteens she carried. They were insulated, so that the long draught she swallowed was still cool and quenching.

The Maple stood free of other trees for a thirty-foot radius. Although it was not taller than all the other trees, the immense girth that the tree had grown to, with its rising Gordian knot made of smaller trunks, and marked it as a tremendously old tree. Its crown retained a hearty growth of leaves. At its base, on the side facing her rose a sapling-like offshoot. Brenda wondered if this was a separate tree, or another corded trunk which would join the others in their frozen ballet as they reached for the skies. "I think I will call you Old Man of the Woods!" she said aloud.

She arose again, and approached the edge of the dried pond. Treading lightly onto the dried leaves, Brenda cautiously probed for firm footing. The bottom felt rock hard and a small cloud of decayed leaf matter dusted the top of her toes. Not letting her guard down, she carefully made her way to within ten feet of the huge trunk. The sapling, with its leafy boughs, obscured a good portion of the tree in her camera's viewfinder. She began to circle the tree to the left and retreating to crop the perfect image.

When she had completed a little more than half the circle, Brenda found that by backing up several yards, a fantastic photo of the Swamp Maple was there for the taking. There was only one disturbing item in the viewfinder as she gave it a final check. Brenda was now facing the grassy knoll, and in the picture would be her discarded backpack. She knew that she was being a bit anal, but heck she thought, it wasn't even sitting nicely. Brenda had left the pack opened and some of the contents she had removed to access the camera were strewn about on the grass like litter. Her boots and a shiny canteen augmented the eyesore that threatened to compromise her nature photo.

No problem, she thought and started towards the shore on the other side of the tree. Brenda's enthusiasm was piqued, and her strides were graceful and long. On the third step, Brenda abruptly pitched forward as her right leg sank to its mid-calf into rich black mud.

"Ooooh dammit! " she exclaimed, but exasperation instantly turned to fear as her immersed foot found no solid support and her momentum continued to carry her forward.

A guttural, " Uunnnhhhg! " sprang from Brenda's lips as the air rushed from her lungs and she continued to topple forward. She had started to fall, and to stop that; Brenda instinctively had kicked her left leg out in front of her as a brace. To her amazement, instead of the needed support, her left leg plunged with a wet slurping sound fully to her knee. The entrapped woman's arms were cast forward and she lost her grip on the camera, which was tossed four yards ahead and landed softly on the dried leaves. Brenda's weight had been transferred completely to her forward leg, which caused it to descend further into the yielding ooze nearly to the middle of her thigh. The unstable soil burped a few bubbles into the afternoon's still air, and then took more of Brenda's trapped upper leg into its grim confinement. Thinner liquid silt was percolating up along her creamy thigh and nipping at the hem of her cutoff shorts. Brenda held her arms spread out like a tightrope walker's as she struggled to maintain her balance.

"YIIIiiii! Heeelllp meeeeee! "The trapped woman cried out in a shrill voice. Brenda repeated her appeals for almost two minutes with all the energy that she could summon, then waited and hoped for a responding hail.

The ground in front of her rolled and rippled, broadcasting every little motion that Brenda made. Dusty dead leaves that had covered the treacherous pitfall parted in places to reveal the quaking coal colored pool that had claimed her as its captive.

Except for the distant buzzing drone of the cicadas, the forest had remained mute to her desperate pleas and she knew that she was alone. An aroma of long decayed vegetation arose from the simmering muck. The immersed woman found the earthy scent to be both horrid and yet stirring to her, in a primal fashion.

Brenda hoped that she could cautiously ease out of the marsh backwards and regain secure ground again. Shifting her weight back towards her right leg, Brenda promptly found that the bog's tenacious grasp on her left leg was more than she had estimated. The voracious mud reached to above her knee, as it engulfed the sinking woman's right leg. She stopped to measure her situation and try the best option. Brenda's heart was beating a rapid tattoo within her breast. A fog of confusion and frenzy was pounding at her rationality with sledgehammer blows.

The insatiable mire that was gripping Brenda's legs looked as black as tar, and creamy in its consistency. The sun beating down on it all day had heated the upper two feet of the mulched soup. At the depth her left foot was enveloped to, it held with an undisturbed chill that felt like a lusciously cool embrace. Brenda could not feel a firm bottom yet, and had to keep shifting her balance with her hips, to remain upright. The support under each of her feet kept randomly disintegrating while the fetid fen drew its swaying captive continuously deeper.

The sucking morass had taken Brenda into its clinging clutches beyond the hemline of each leg on her denim shorts. Sun-heated surface muck pushed its way up into her shorts and massaged her straining thighs. Its touch was an ardent and thorough caress on her smooth flesh. If this wasn't so dangerous, it would be sexy, she thought. Brenda could feel the spark of an enticement being engendered within her. She considered the absence of having control over the situation, to be kind of arousing also. The ooze beneath her became thinner and Brenda looked down in horror as the muddy earth consumed her at an accelerated rate.

Sitting backwards and out were no longer an option as the shifting surface of the quagmire pressed firmly up against her ass, telling Brenda that she had been taken too far into its gluttonous grasp to escape that way. The slippery ooze poured into the junction of the denim-clad legs and surrounded her excited crotch. Suddenly her feet greeted the resistance of a firm bottom and Brenda let out a laughing sigh of relief.

She knew that a footstep away and behind her was solid ground. She also realized that she couldn't back up. Brenda began twisting her hips in an effort to turn around and then she could lean over and drag herself out. The swamp's hold on her yielded covetously as she churned the muck into a bubbling broth with her effort. Hot silt was seeping around and pressing on some very sensitive parts of her anatomy. Brenda noticed that she was trembling and knew from a tightness deep in her lower tummy, that a hunger was being fostered from within her loins.

Brenda stopped her gyrations and took in a deep breath. This is very exhilarating she had thought. I am held tightly in the grip of the earth that I have always respected so dearly and here it is, naughtily making advances to me. Brenda renewed her pendulant efforts to reach firmer ground, but now escape was not the foremost item on her mind.

She began rationalizing the circumstances into an alibi that would override behavioral restrictions that were unthinkably correct an hour ago. Brenda was, after all, alone out here. A consenting adult in privacy, doing harm to no one else. She also assessed that being planted in the moist soil near the base of the spectacular Swamp Maple to be a very erotic situation.

Brenda had pivoted two-thirds of the way around and freedom seemed an inevitable event, when she stopped again. She drew her hands to her exposed navel and pressed upon her tummy lightly. The feel of her flesh on her flesh caused Brenda to shudder. Her hands drifted downward and fumbled to open the snap on her shorts. She stretched the zipper apart and looked down on the dark and soupy humus forcing its way up against her excited womanhood. Brenda slid her index fingers into the waistband of her panties and pulled them away from her hips. She was still looking down and saw the mulch particles enmeshed in the soft golden down of her pubic nest. It's like the Earth is seducing me, she surmised. It wants to explore into me and know me she thought with fervor.

Brenda bit her lower lip as she watched her hands move down the junctions of her hips and toward her vagina. The elastic band of her briefs climbed above Brenda's wrists as she reached in deeper. Her fingers began gently tracing dances along the edges of her engorged labial lips. Brenda's left hand ran two fingers along the center of her humid slit as the bewitched woman's right hand sought her clitoris. A rolling shiver telegraphed its way up her spine, and she knew that she could not stop now. Brenda pinched and nibbled her palpitating love-button with her right hand, and she penetrated herself with her left hand, sanctioning the sun-steeped ooze's access into her own heated love tunnel.

Emitting a throaty hummed moan, Brenda drew her upper arms inward and against the sides of her breasts. The wanton wader wished to reach up and cradle her swelling bust with the churned sauce of the swamp. Her blouse, which was a recent present from her children, was dear to her and she feared that it might never come clean again. Yet in her mind's eye, the pressure that her biceps played against her sweating bosom was the muddy fondling she yearned for.

Brenda oscillated her hips from side to side, which caused the surface of the obsidian porridge to tremble in undulating and radiating waves, a mirror of the advancing ripples surging up from within her own body. The enraptured woman's breathing came in deep rasps as her hands moved with increasing frenzy. Brenda desired to have the steamy muck to hold her ass too. She begrudgingly removed her hands from her craving mons. The heated vixen eagerly pulled down at the sides of her shorts and rolled her panties down over her rump and hips. The dark creamy slush flowed into her garments and encompassed Brenda's eager pulsating flanks.

Oozing stew flowed into the relaxed crack of Brenda's twitching posterior at the instant and she climaxed with a groan while she instinctively thrust her pelvis forward. A small jet of juicy discharge erupted past her fingers and onto the slate toned marsh. This was a first for Brenda, and it had been the best release she had ever known. She ceased all movement except for an uncontrollable quaking, as she regarded her emission of passion.

Enthralled, she scooped up the substance with her left palm and stirred her right hand's index finger through it. Brenda raised her finger to her lips and tasted the slippery issuance. She gathered some of the flowing silt up and blended it with her own body's sauce, then returned the concoction to the surface of the morass. She found herself strangely excited to realize that the nectar of her passion would go into the soil that nurtured the Swamp Maple, and its essence would be carried up into the giant.

Brenda gazed down at the shifting black mush which encircled her body up to her lower hips. Her heartbeat, which had subsided to normal, was accelerating again and Brenda knew that lustful pressures would be summoning her to their release again soon. This felt so decadently erotic that she decided to save herself for another depth of involvement. Brenda resolved to delay any pending eruption, so that the event was to be more significant for her. She would approach this pleasure in a ritualistic manner that would allow her fantasies a full reign in the outcome.

Brenda wiped her soiled hands on the few remaining clean surfaces of her denim shorts. Being as careful as she could, so as not to get her blouse too dirty, she unfastened its remaining buttons and untied the knotted shirt-tails above her tummy. She squirmed out of it and tossed the garment several feet in the direction of her back-trail. Brenda was instantly mindful of the sun, which baked down on her taught nipples. Impatiently, her hands re-entered the inky soil, and with fumbling fingers, the panting female drew her shorts closed and re-fastened the snap on them.

Leaning towards the direction that she had fallen into the bog from, Brenda placed her forearm along the pond's firm bottom and hoisted against the mud's tenacious grip. After a few experiments, she learned that she had to use both arms, and keep her toes pointed down to make any progress. Brenda's legs finally came free with a loud and gurgling slurp, like a goody that has been pulled from slobbering and greedy lips.

As she stood up, Brenda was surprised at how heavy the clinging muck made her legs feel. Once again, the exited female unsnapped her muddied denims, and their new weight quickly dropped them to her ankles. Brenda stepped out of them and brought them near to where she had tossed her blouse.

The searing heat from the Sun was roasting her mercilessly and she could feel the sweat running down her as it formed streaks on her muddied flesh. Standing in only her muddied panties, Brenda scanned the shoreline carefully to assure herself that she was still alone. Satisfied, she peeled her hopelessly soiled undergarment over her rump and stepped out of them also. The humus that had caked to her skin dried in moments. As she moved it fell away from her in dusky clumps. Brenda lightly brushed at her flesh to remove the final swampy vestiges of her exploit and marveled at the dusky coloration that remained in place of the ebony sludge. In her opinion, she seemed to be clad in charcoal gray, hip-hugging leotards.

With a frown, the unveiled female stood in front of the boggy ground for a moment, trying to decide how best to return to the sinuous embrace of the mire. Brenda was facing the monumental Swamp Maple as it spanned skyward a mere six yards distant, drawing its nutrition and power from the same organic broth that she had planned to enter.

Trembling with excitement she sidestepped carefully, until she was several yards from the point where she had been first entrapped and ten yards from the tree's gnarly trunk. Brenda's hand released her panties and she took two fast steps forward. Nothing happened. She cupped her breasts and rolled her nipples between her thumbs and forefingers with a tweak that made them ache and stiffen. Brenda took a third step, and still nothing. Impatiently she stomped down with a bouncing weight and the surface of the ground in front of her trembled as ripples pulsated along the basin ahead of her. A smile bowed Brenda's sweet, full lips and she let her drop again to her sides