Villagers gathered around the gate to the ruin at sunset. From his vantage point in an arrow-slit the rat with red-eyes looked on knowingly. He'd heard about this from elders of his kin, so knew what to expect. Using a log the assailants broke down the rotten door. The rat turned around. Scampered along a beam. Squeaked to a bat and hid himself in the remains of a chandelier.

     The throng lit their torches to banish the evening's shadows. At a squeak from above two wolves leapt out to savage a fat farmer. When his fellow rabble members started to defend the rustic, the pair ran off. They'd only been asked to put up a token defense.

     The red eyed rat clambered down a mould-ridden tapestry and squeezed between broken floor boards.

     The peasants had found the crypt and the coffin therein. They surrounded the ornate wooden box. A burley blacksmith armed with a crow bar pushed through. With a crack the lid splintered apart. Silence descended at the sight of the pale form within.

     The red-eyed rat had expected this time to come. He'd been told stories by other vampires of how villagers storm the safest holds, bringing with them the stake and the garlic. This one had made his own plans.

     Someone pulled out the traditional Hawthorn stake. The rat wondered if there was a factory somewhere making them, available from a catalogue. The effigy had taken a good portion of his wealth to have made. The point was pressed to the dressed wax chest. Such care that the man had taken in its construction. The hammer was raised. Asked for a lock of his hair. The hand was still. Pairings from his nails. The tool started to descend. The sculptor had had to travel all the way from the Caribbean. The sharpened end dug into the blood-filled bladder, releasing its' load to splash on the surrounding hoard. How they'll fear a taint.

     The rat doubled up. Surprise across its tiny face. The mallet struck home a second time. The rodent contorted, bent into two.

     A final thought crossed its thumb-end sized undead brain.

     "The bastard was from Haiti."