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It is dark in the cemetery. A cold wind is blowing, trying to extinguish a long black candle in a candelabra shaped like an old lantern.

The paw holding the lantern trembles slightly. But it is not fear, no. What can you be afraid of in a cemetery at night? Especially when your soul is as dark as the night itself? The gusty wind extinguishes the candle anyway and the cape-wrapped figure remains in total darkness.

"Root, Rooty! " he hisses as he looks around.

"What?" a round ball of indeterminate colour rolls closer.

"Give me a lucifer, the candle is out," Gothic Hare's voice quivers.

But it's not from fear, it's from cold. What is there to be afraid of in the dark if you are yourself a creature of the night?

In the silence comes the strike of a match and a pale, blinking flame rises again above the black candle. Now it can be seen that the paw with the candle is also completely black. The entire Hare is black, cloaked up to the neck in a black cape with a red lining.

The round figure next to him still looks most like a root vegetable. But it is not clear what colour it is, nor what kind it is.

"Hare, are you sure this is the right night?"

"The night of the dark moon is the best night to choose a tomb."

"Do we necessarily have to live in a tomb?"

"This is how all the children of the night live. It is written in the Black Book."

"There's nothing written in the Black Book, because all the pages are black," objects the mysterieus vegetable, "you can't see a letter on it."

"Not in the daytime, but in the moonlight you can see everything that may be seen."

"The moonlight wouldn't be unpleasant now..."

The two peer blindly around in the thick darkness.

"Lucifers!!!!" suddenly comes a terrifying roar from very close by, "lucifers!!!"

In the spot where just moments ago long black ears proudly poked into the moonless sky, now there is no one. Left alone, the strange root quickly begins to turn pale and look like a ripe sugar beet.

"Hare, where are you?"

"Hush you!" comes from the tall thorny bushes, whose bare branches have the last withered leaves dangling on top. "Don't call attention!"

"Lucifers!!!! " sounds menacingly again, "give me lucifers!!!"

From an invisible black hole in the dark that looks suspiciously like a grave, a bony, cold hand sticks out. The teeth of the enigmatic root clatter loudly. The thorny bushes beside him tremble in unison. But fear it is not. What is there to be afraid of sitting in the bushes on a moonless night? The hand rumbles in the darkness, rustling through the dry, tough grass that only grows in old, abandoned cemeteries.

"Rooty, give him lucifers!" comes a stifled squeak from the bushes.

"Oy, cold!" comments the root, touching long crooked fingers with outgrown nails, squeezing his eyes shut and shoving the box forward.

"Cold and well," is answered from the hole and the hand with the lucifers disappears into it.

"At least then you know they are resting," comes again from the ominous depths.

"Who? Resting?" the two ask breathlessly in chorus.

"The deadies, who else," the lucifer box ruffles in the hole and a flame lights up.

"Aah!!!"

Gothic Hare jumps out of the shrubbery, bumps into his bulbous companion and together they plop to the ground. After rolling over themselves two or three times, they fall into the hole.

"Quiet, or you'll wake them all up."

A lucifer flashes above them again, illuminating the pale, swollen face of a ghoul. His long, skinny hands deftly pick at the wet clay.

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"Here!" yells the ghoul triumphantly, throwing a large key into the air.

It is undoubtedly silver, recognises Gothic Hare. Nothing is more like moonlight than silver. He remembers the clear, quiet nights in his home fields, where there are no deadies or ghouls in their green too-short coats. One side of his cape now looks like a bubble. It is Root and he has no intention of getting out.

"Where are we?" he squeaks softly.

"In the grave, where else," the ghoul replies and turns to them. "The last spring they dug all sorts of things, but where are the newcomers? Nowhere. And I should just be careful. Look, the key to the tomb and I almost lost it here."

"The tomb?" springs up Gothic Hare, "are there more here?"

"For tombs, there is a waiting list. For years," the ghoul looks at him suspiciously. "What do you want with that? You are not from here anyhow."

"Gothic Hare, the creature of the night and the poet of moonlight," the Hare politely extends his paw to the stranger, "and this is Deadly Root."

An indignant sound comes from under his cape.

"Night Watcher. I watch over the dead ones at night," the lanky ghoul shakes his paw.

Somewhere above them, the wind is still blowing. Root feels a cold, unpleasant touch. It is an earthworm.

"Hare, I don't like graves! I want to go home, to the field!" he rolls out from under the cape and changes colour to purple, beginning to look like a turnip.

"In the field is the farmer, tractor, artificial fertiliser and no freedom," Gothic Hare responds reasonably.

"But it's too early for me to go into the grave!"

"Doesn't a root belong in the ground then?" inquires the ghoul.

"He's better not," Gothic Hare replies for his friend.

"Why not?"

"He will sprout."

"Ah," nods Night Watcher. "Let's go to my tomb, then, for tea. It's terribly damp here," he wrinkles his nose disgruntled.

Soon the three are in a small cosy dungeon lit by a warm yellow fire. A white enamel kettle heats up hanging over the hearth. Night Watcher flips through the Black Book with respect.

"Alas, for the living there are no tombs," he slams the black pages shut.

Groaning, he gets up from his chair and pours tea for everyone in old glasses muddied by the years. For some reason, the tea is green and smells like moss, but Gothic Hare has never tasted such a delicious one. A dark, tempting taste of the night hangs on his whiskers.

"When you die, you are very welcome to the queue."

"What should we do until then?"

"Stay here," the Night Watcher's hand hospitably circles the small room with cobwebs in the corners, "until you die. And then I'll make sure you get on the lists."

"Very gladly!" Gothic Hare is ready to dance out of joy, but joy is not appropriate in a night tomb.

Thin, pale mushrooms grow between the cracked floorboards and his ears tickle against the too-low ceiling, startling the spiders. The new house is full of darkness and ghosts. The new house seems wonderful to Gothic Hare! Outside owls are calling. Root hears none of this. He is asleep. Soon it will be morning.

Shuffling on worn shovels, Night Watcher closes the door. The iron lock clangs loudly and silence reigns again in the tomb.

"And the night has passed ,

and the day has come,

but the sun does not enter the dungeon..."

G. H.

Gothic Hare puts a graceful old-fashioned signature on the black pages with a much-used pencil and closes the Black Book....