He made it, though, falling in the snow behind it, the dusting of snow on top of the log undisturbed. The trunk was just barely tall enough to hide him from the humans in the dim winter light, and he waited, trembling from reaction, as he heard them race by. They'd grabbed a pair of torches and the shaky light danced on the snow capping the log as the humans passed him by, unnoticed.
Relief. Such relief. (hunt! hunt! the voices urged, seeing running humans and bringing a bloody thirst again). He pushed himself up, limping and staggering quickly through the trees to the clearing. He could hear the scream and the uproar as they stumbled onto the dismembered corpses strewn about, so close, so close, and with fumbling hands he fought to release the coffin.
It was heavy, so heavy, so hard to move, but desperation and the pinking of the sky pushed him to his limits. Pulling it onto his back, he moved away, staggering off down the trail, hoping that the repeated passage of horses and trampled snow would hide his own limping footprints. A few hundred yards down the road, it crossed a small stream, frozen solid. With a whimper, sun rising over the trees, he half-leaped, half-fell from the bridge onto the ice, shoving and scraping the coffin across the surface. It barely fit under the bridge, just enough clearance to pull the lid off and crawl inside. The sun blazed through the trees, down the clear length of the streambed, and struck him with the force of a furnace. Blinded, face and hands blistering, great welts rising through the shredded remains of his clothes, he struggled into the coffin, sliding the lid over him.
Cool, quiet...peace. The comfort of his soil, the ancient and dry taste of his sanctuary in his mouth. Racked with pain from the burns and the silver, the vampire twitched and shuddered, whimpering softly until he was finally able to sleep and heal.