Trapped in a Cabin

Three girls are rescued from the snow and, by force, need to spend a few days with trappers in their cabin. Three big hairy men and three young women. There is nothing the girls can do to stop the men doing what they will: and, of course, they do.

It seemed a good idea at the time. How many have set out with the best of intentions, and everything has gone wrong? For Tanny, Rachie and Cess it had not just gone wrong but horribly, dangerously, life threateningly wrong.

Setting off from their car up into the hills had been simply wonderful; the thrill of adventure strong; the day perfect; the prospect of the hike exciting. The weather glorious, the sun beating down but with the shade of the pines and the cooler mountain air there was no chance of getting too hot. The girls had laughed, even sung, as they had climbed higher; young limbs working hard; young limbs in shorts and tee shirts. A girls' outing, a girls' adventure: a day without the boyfriends, a day like they used to have when they played together when at school. They had not been stupid; they had brought clothes for the mountains; they were well equipped in their backpacks.

Well-equipped for a long day's walk high up on clear trails - trails well marked on their map. Well-equipped for the day even if the weather turned to rain. Well-equipped for cold on the mountains. Well equipped, had the weather not turned, as it had, quite so much. It was a sudden change; not just the usual sort of change but a violent change; the snow unexpected and then turning to blizzard. Well equipped, probably even so, had they not lost their way. The map not so useful when the trail became obscured and then they made a wrong choice or two after they turned back. Gone the shorts, hidden the tee shirts: instead beneath sweaters, trousers and waterproofs the girls trudged on - but to where? They were lost in a mountain wilderness. At least the pines kept the cold, biting wind away but the girls were cold, very cold. Should they stop and build a fire? But they had no shelter - and no matches. Not one of them smoked which had always seemed a good thing to them, until now - no matches and no lighter. Did they know how to light a fire without manufactured aid - Girl Guides had been too long ago and they had not really listened.

The change from the pleasant comfortable security of twentieth century life with all of its benefits, cars, plentiful clothing, central heating and the rest, to feeling they had been transported to a world of simple unforgiving nature. A primitive world of mountains, forest and icy cold. A world perhaps red in tooth and claw. There was nothing of the modern world around them. They could have been lost, just like that, a hundred or more years before.

It was occurring to each separately that their predicament was not at all a good idea. That there was a serious risk they were not going to get out of their predicament alive. They could keep walking, all night, if need be, but what if the next day was no better and they were walking not back to the road and friendly trails but further into the wilderness - and it did now seem very wild.

Rachie slipped; no real problem in itself and she did not hurt herself, but it further sapped the girls' will. Rachie burst into tears, and it set the others off. Tears freezing on your face did not help at all. They were getting truly frightened and that dangerous companion, Despair, had quietly come up behind and joined them. It had been creeping up behind them for some time, catching them up and then making its unwelcome appearance. A fifth member of the party. Unseen but very much there.

The wind faltered and dropped above the trees and in the silence and dark the snow just kept falling, softly and with a steady persistence. It was starting to become so deep in places that it made progress less easy and, of course, any suggestion of track invisible on the ground. The world was white and black around them; the snow falling silently; and the feeling of loneliness strong.

"You don't think there are wolves," said Cess. It was not really a question.

"I don't think there is anything," replied Tanny. And certainly, there seemed nothing about, just silent emptiness, the trees, the dark and the snow.

"What are we going to do?" It was Rachie. It was a stupid question really. They had no plan.

On they trudged but the going was getting slower and they were slower. They were done in, quite exhausted and cold - and their collective will was going. Things were not looking good - not good at all. Despair was rubbing its hands.

It was not immediate. It was as if for a moment something was there and then gone. As if something was slipping in and out of existence or they were slipping in and out of its existence; but there seemed as if there was something and, then, there was a light, a faint light across a valley. A human yellowish light in a world of white and black, snow and night. A light which they could but head towards. It caused an instant raising of spirits. Despair suddenly began to trail behind them.

"Did you see that!" They had not been quite sure at first - but they had seen it.

No question that they should head for any sign of habitation. It meant descending down through pines and up again. The light visible from where they were high up but they knew would be lost to sight if they moved down and towards it. It seemed a friendly pinprick of humanity in a white, dark, cold wilderness. Descending into trees would mean losing sight of the light but they had to try. It surely would mean shelter, warmth, food, contact. Their talk was suddenly animated - more than monosyllabic - it was not a matter of debate whether they should try for the hut, but how?

Down through the pines they plunged. The stream at the bottom unwelcome in the extreme - and there was no ford, let alone bridge they could find in the snow and the dark. Already cold they knew the stupidity of getting wet on a night like that - in weather like that - but the alternative of losing the light was unthinkable and probably more stupid. The debate was short, they knew the risk and took it. The water was icy and it rose up inside their waterproof trousers despite tucking the legs into their socks. Hand in hand they stepped through the stream towards the other side. Perhaps they would have been better going singly because when Tanny fell she pulled the others in too. On a hot summer's day it would have been amusing. It was anything but... the situation went from bad to worse. Despair forded the stream with ease.

The girls were now really wet and really, really cold. They needed to find the light or they were not going to survive. It had been probably the right decision, but it shortened everything if it was not. It would not really matter.

Shivering, teeth literally chattering, they made their way upwards towards where they thought they had seen the light.

Not everything went wrong that day. It had started so well, with such high hopes; hopes that had been dashed by the unexpected onslaught of the weather. But their hope of finding their way from their sighting of the glimmer of light through the forest to the light was not in vain. The shear awfulness of not finding the light again was certainly starkly present in their minds. It would not just be Despair coming up behind them and Hope stumbling and falling far behind but, worse, a dark clothed figure coming silently towards them carrying a scythe - Death.

Climbing up through pines, slipping on the falling snow the girls almost immediately saw their glimmer of yellow light - they had not lost their way down the hillside and had come almost straight up to it. A change of fortune indeed.

It was not so much a house as a cabin - a cabin built of logs with a stone chimney in a clearing. A real mountain home like they had seen in old photographs and pictures. From a window came yellow light shining onto the snow outside. It was not that many more yards to it. The girls did not ask why it was there or who was living within, they just banged on the door, sure of a welcome, sure somebody would be inside.

The door did not open a crack, there was no tremulous 'who's there' from inside, no furtive peeking; instead, the door was opened with a crash by an occupant who was not afraid of the night or whoever or whatever it might bring. The girls could immediately see why there was no fear even though he was just silhouetted by the light; he was big, very big, a real substantial hulk of a man. A man who clearly needed to fear no one.

"What? What are you? You... get in. You look half... half drowned... more like, half dead. How many are there o' you?"

They stumbled in and the door banged shut behind the girls. They were out of the cold, out of the snow, out of the wild and into the cosy warmth of a cabin, a cabin lit with oil lamps and, moreover, with a fire burning away in a big stone fireplace and a stove with a kettle hissing above it. The change so total. It was a fairytale like scene, and it seemed to Tanny that if she was not actually going to live 'happily ever after' she was certainly going to live. In truth it was a fairytale deliverance for the girls. Despair stayed outside in the cold.

"We were walking and..." but the man was taking no notice, already he was pouring steaming coffee from a pot for the girls into tin cups.

"Don't scald yerselves."

And it was good advice. They could hardly hold the tin mugs so much were they shaking.

Behind them the door opened again, letting in for the moment a feel of the cold they had just escaped and in came another two men, no smaller than the first, dressed in furs and stout boots - clothing for the weather.

They were big men, very male men: it was instantly clear these were not like the sort of boys or men the girls normally met or knew. Not the androgynous look of the male film stars of the moment; nor the frequent showering, slim, besuited, soft handed, office workers of the modern city: no, quite, quite different. Strong, powerful, calloused real men. Men who would not take it from a woman if she told them what to do - or where to go. Men used to their physical superiority, used to hard work and privation. Men suited to the mountains -- where, and when the mountains were wild.

"Who'er these, Jed?"

"Jus' turned up. I've given 'em coffee to warm 'em."

"Need more than that. They look right done in. Not right for young women to be out alone. Where's your menfolk?"

It was Rachie, "We were walking and the weather turned bad. Just going for a hike to see the mountains and we got lost..."

The third man pushed back his hood revealing flame red hair and a beard to match. There was ice in his beard. "Stupid. We'll need to get those wet clothes off."

His hands felt. Rough, no-nonsense hands. "They're wet through. Stupid. What yer do, fall in the stream?"

Tanny was not sure about the 'we' but she was too cold to argue. Rough fingers began working at her clothes easing them from her

"You'll feel better with something hot inside yer."

The phrase seemed innocuous enough on the face of it but there was the possibility of double meaning. The three girls looked at each other. What might happen to them?

The man called Jed ladled a thick broth into bowls. It was clear they were meant to eat.

It was one thing to have waterproofs removed, another to have soggy jumpers and even trousers removed but the tee shirts and then the bras and panties seemed a step too far. Those flimsy bits were no more dry or warm than any of their other clothing and, even if they had the strength to resist, it would have seemed ungrateful or rude. The men seemed merely to be helpful - there was no ribaldry or comment made as more and more, rather blue girl flesh came into view, even nipples pointy with cold and very damp buttocks. Towels were handed, there was no gawping, and certainly no groping, or leaving the girls naked for longer than necessary.

The girls felt better and decidedly more decent and safe draped in towels and eating cornbread and the broth. Never had food tasted more delicious. The girls did not yet feel a need to talk. They were worn through, cold and exhausted.

The stove made the cabin really hot. Tanny watched the men building the fire and heating more water in the black kettle. The appearance of the tin bath explained the water and all of a sudden Tanny realised she was going to be expected to bathe right in the middle of the cabin and there seemed no attempt being made to rig some sort of screen or curtain for modesty.

"It's not good getting cold like that. One thing to have som'at hot inside you, and Jed and we'll rustle up som'at else later, but the whole body needs a' warming. Who's to be first?"

It was Rachie. How strange to see their friend stepping into a tin bath in front of the stove, the pinkness starting to climb up her bare legs until she slowly settled herself in the steaming water, her eyes closing with the sheer pleasure of the warmth. Tanny looked forward to her turn. Rough male hands reached for the soap, strong clean smelling carbolic soap - not lavender, not primrose, not honeysuckle - there was nothing feminine about the cabin, it was a place of men. But there was soap. Rough big male hands lathered, rough male hands soaped the little girl leaving nothing left untouched, nothing unrubbed. Tanny saw there was, indeed, nothing, nothing at all left untouched.

Tanny was not sure; really not sure that was right; why did the men not leave the girls to their own bathing; they were being helpful but - this seemed more than help.

Rachie, then Cess and then it was Tanny's turn. More water to keep the bath hot. Fresh hands - it seemed the men were taking it in turns. Was it to have their fair share of the girls or the equal burden of a chore? Rough fingers and the carbolic everywhere - absolutely everywhere.

A rough rubbing dry with the coarse towels they had been wrapped in. Not a towel to wrap modestly around her body but simply a towel to dry. The girls were not given fresh, dry, towels to clothe themselves in. The cabin by now was very warm indeed and there was no real need.

It did not seem the water was, after all, merely for the girls. Perhaps 'waste not, want not' was the motto or perhaps having gone to the bother of preparing a bath the men thought they should take advantage of the opportunity. They did not make a big thing of it but Tanny realised that male clothes were coming off, britches and shirts - yes, even longjohns, of all things. Great hairy male bodies beginning to appear until all three of them were naked.

Naked, Tanny looked from her friends to the men. Naked the difference in the sexes was even more pronounced than when clothed. Indeed as much, or more so, than with a bull and cows or a ram and sheep. The females were young, smaller and finer boned. soft skined, curved and with rounded breasts of varying sizes; hairless but for the tops of their heads and the soft down upon mounded pubis; their generative organs largely obscured. The males, on the other hand, were huge in comparison, taller, heavier, stronger; their musculature so much more visible, their skin rough in many places, great barrels of chests, calloused hands from hard work and all three were hirsute. It was not simply the shaggy heads and great beards, but their chests and even backs were hairy, their legs, looking somewhat like tree trunks, were covered in fine wiry curls and their arms were no less protected. But, of course, what particularly showed their maleness was their sexual organs. Not tucked neatly out of sight - quite the opposite, in fact.

Tanny could not think of them as anything but large. Great swinging penises and hanging ballocks. The sort of thing a mother might frighten her potentially wayward daughter with - and succeed. They brought the image of the proud bull or ram back into Tanny's mind. She had seen both swaggering across the field, when younger, and been wide eyed at what swung. Her eyes had been stretched further when she had seen the bull approach the heifer and the stallion approach the mare. There had been not just the great swinging bollocks, but the pole, rigid and purposeful. It both frightened and excited her then - and she was frightened again now, a real fear the men would get it into their heads to take their pleasure. Fear but a certain excitement at the prospect of seeing the trappers like the bull or stallion, magnificent in their maleness with their poles rigid and purposeful.

She wondered what the men did when alone and without women. But, there again, what might she do if she shared a bed with her friends for a long hard winter?

The bathing was business-like and ordered, as if the men knew who would be first and who would be last - Jed. The carbolic well used. The water kept warm from the kettle.

Another bowl, more food, a rich mess of greens and perhaps mountain game. The six sat at table, eating well. The rather strange sight of six naked people, pink and fresh from their bath sitting together, more steaming coffee, plentiful food, a happy scene indeed and, now warm, relaxed and with full bellies, Tanny, Cess and Rachie could, finally, tell more of their story.

"No getting out of here. T'weather's closed in for days. Be piled high by mornin' shouldn't wonder."

"Grill's right enough," said Jed.

"You can stay s'long as you do chores and things."

It was 'the things' that worried Tanny. What things? She was sure she knew. She looked at the black headed man, Grill, who had spoken. There was not the hint of a leer even with the girls' boobies so very visible to the men. Tanny could not get over how hairy the men were.

It was Rachie. "OK with us. You are kind. Thank you. If we hadn't found your cabin then..."

There was a sound in the chimney, the wind was rising.

"We'd ha' buried the bones." Probably Jed meant it kindly; simply saying that he and the others would have looked after the girls' bodies or what remained after the animals had taken their fill. It was chilling nonetheless.

Tanny looked at the window. Had they not found the cabin they would not have been dead yet: not quite, but probably would have been by early morning - it was too awful to think of. One by one they would have gone. And down below in the valley their car would be sitting waiting for their return just as they left it, the key ready to be turned. Waiting for a return that would not have happened. And back home their folks and friends would have got worried. Perhaps not today as the girls had said they would be late, but tomorrow. Tomorrow would bring the search parties.

"Have you a 'phone?"

"Don't be silly Tanny. No wires." Rachie turned to the men, "You haven't have you?"

There was silence from them and then the red bearded one shook his head.

"You are here with us now."

"Abe's right enough," said Jed, "This'll last days and it'll be a long cold night. Best we was in bed."

It was as if the unmentioned thing that had been lurking in the dark, but warm and cosy, corner of the room had suddenly been named. It was not just Tanny who had noticed the single big brass bed. Where did all the men sleep and moreover where were the men sleeping tonight and where were the girls to sleep? They were tired. And Jed had said it was time 'we' and not 'you' were in bed.

There was a pause, the men looked at the girls. Tanny was suddenly unsure of what they were thinking. The men seemed to be looking at the girls in a different way.

There was a scraping back of chairs and slowly the men rose and the girls gasped in unison at the transformation. Sitting at table they had not been able to see the lower parts of the men: but, now standing, they were fully revealed; hidden underneath the table the girls had not seen the transformation - the engorgement.