The Adventures of Campy Girlymann Continue

"You two must be those bikers everyone is looking for."

Girlymann and Vic looked at each other before turning to the stranger. Campy stood up and brushed some leaves from the back of his pants.

"Campy. Campy Girlymann and you?"

"Better left unsaid in case the Du Claudes skin you alive asking questions."

Campy's blood pressure rose. "We wouldn't want that."  He remembered what the witch and troll had said, about a price on their head.

Vic stood as well and offered his hand to the stranger. But the stranger didn't take the offer. Instead, he looked Vic and Campy over from head to foot with what looked like a bit of disgust.

"Don't worry none. The Du Claudes are not my friends. They steal my truffles each year and leave me with less than half  of what my pigs find. They are as worthless as cyclists."  Then he spit on the ground and raised his stick toward the horizon where the dirt road disappeared among the foothills and oak groves.

"Your best chance is to take this dirt road, stay off the side roads. They all dead end at some point. Once you hit pavement the road becomes a wicked winding descent into the next valley. If you should reach that valley, the Du Claudes can't touch you.  The house of Du Claude are mortal enemies of that region going back centuries."

The stranger then lowered his walking stick, "Best get back to my pigs before they eat what little I'll have after the Du Claudes take their fill."

With that the stranger turned his back on the two men and walked on toward the sound of grunts coming not far away.

Campy and Vic watched him disappear among the oaks and laurel. Then they turned to each other and started to laugh. "Guess there's only one thing to do," Campy said as he picked up his bike from the grass and began to inspect it.

"Ride out of Dodge?" Vic asked.

"Hell yeah, and get our asses to this valley pronto." Campy's eye was caught by a bulge in the back pocket of Vic's jersey. "Say Vic?"

"Yeah?"

"What's in your pocket?"

Vic looked a bit astonished, "I was going to ask you the same thing."

To be continued.....