Late one night, a farmer was riding back to town on his horse after a long day's work in a nearby town. He was very exhausted, as was his horse, so he decided they could both use a break for a few hours and then continue into town. The farmer looked all around for a nice place to rest but the only place he saw that really had nice amounts of grass was a cemetery. He felt awful about it but he knew that he just couldn't continue so he stretched out on top of one of the graves to try to get some rest. He just kept lying there trying to sleep but wasn't able to fall asleep.Soon the man heard a noise coming from not too far away from where he was lying.
The man was so spooked he ran behind one of the gravestones but kept peering out from behind it to see what was going on. The man saw arise from the grave next to where he had just been trying to sleep a mysterious figure rise out of a coffin. The entire town was very superstitious, so the farmer knew what he was looking at. He was watching a vampire rise out of his grave. The vampire was dressed in a long white shroud and was carrying his coffin lid. The vampire's movements were so quick that it was almost hard to see but the farmer followed the white blur that the shroud created as the vampire moved. He saw the vampire lay his coffin lid in front of an abandoned church and then head into town.
The farmer had heard legends that if you steal the coffin lid of a vampire, then the vampire will be unable to lay himself to rest again. The farmer knew that the vampire would be up to no good inside town and took the coffin lid while the vampire was gone so that they could bargain when the vampire returned. The farmer was trying to drag the coffin lid away towards his horse when the vampire returned from town. The vampire had splashes of red all over his mouth which meant that he had definitely been up to no good.
Farmer: "Tell me, vampire, what have you done inside my little town?"
Vampire: "I have slain two young men to feed myself for the night."
Farmer: "I know from legends that you have the power to bring them back to life. Tell me how to do that, vampire, or I will kill you here on the spot."
Vampire:"It is not wise to raise the dead, simple farmer, but if you insist then I will tell you. You must create a smoke that will soak into the pores of the dead men. You must be careful not to breathe in this smoke because it has an opposite effect on the living. Cut off a piece of my shroud here and mix it together in a pot with the hottest coals you can find. Once the pot begins to smoke, make sure that the room is as closed up as possible and leave. Soon after the boys will come back to life."
Farmer: "I will do this, vampire, but how do I know that you are not deceiving me?"
Vampire: "Stupid farmer. The sun will be up very soon and I must be at rest before then. I have given you what you have asked for. Now hand me my coffin lid!"
The farmer did not completely trust the vampire but he believed that it was worth a try. Also, he did not trust being near the vampire much longer either, because he didn't know if the vampire's hunger would come back.
When the farmer got to town, he easily spotted the place where the young men had been killed. The boy's families and many other people of the town were gathered around the house where the boys had been killed by the vampire.The farmer told the families to not mourn because he knew that he could bring the boys back. The farmer performed the ritual just as the vampire had instructed and not long after, the two young men were walking out the front door, alive and well. The families were overjoyed to have their young sons back but soon all the happiness turned into rage toward the farmer. Since he knew how to bring the boys back to life, they figured that he was responsible in some way for their deaths.
The farmer told the family and townsfolk about his strange encounter with the vampire that night. They believed the farmer and soon the entire village was gossiping about the tale. Only a day or so later, the town gathered together and went to the grave where the farmer had seen the vampire rise out of his coffin. It was not quite dark yet, so the vampire was still sleeping when they tore the lid off of the coffin. The mayor of the city took it upon himself to hammer deep into the center of the vampire's chest a large wooden stake. Once the stake went through the heart of the vampire, he would be unable to rise from the dead ever again. The farmer was now a hero among the people in his town. Everywhere he went he received praise for saving those two young boys and killing the evil vampire.
Author' Note: With this story I wanted to try to keep to the tradition of the original story as much as possible. It is easy to see from this story where a lot of modern myths about vampires come from. The original tale had vampires rising at night, sleeping when the sun comes up, and being killed by a stake stuck through their heart. I really didn't have to change anything to make this old vampire myth seem more like a modern one. The word used for the man in the original story is moujik but I wanted to change this because if others are like me then they didn't know what it was until they did a Google search. I found out that it meant a peasant, so I thought a farmer would be a suitable replacement for this. I really liked the original story the way it was so really I just wanted to retell the story in my own words with my own little personal touches. I think that the dialogue is a mixture of the past and present. All of the main details of the story are the same with some minor details that I wanted to help add more to the story. One big change that I made was instead of the vampire rising out from underneath the man, I wanted the vampire to rise from close to him instead. I also wanted the man to hide from the vampire to show that the vampire does cause fear in people. I wanted it to come across through the story that the people of the town had knowledge of vampires and knew how to handle them.
The Coffin Lid Source: W. R. S. Ralston, Russian Folk-Tales (London: Smith, Elder and Co., 1873), pp. 309-311 Link
"Werewolf" by Martin McKenna
Web Source: Epilogue