Warily the pegasi, faerie dragons, sprites, swanmays, and the great form of the gigantic copper dragon circled her and began to move in time to the music again. Stars dove and spun around them as the music swelled, but there was a darkness among them now, a shadow of Mystra's mood that even the most spirited of her leaps did not dispel. "Bad times ahead," said one faerie dragon to another, and there was reluctant agreement. A note of proud defiance crept into Mystra's music as the dance went on. More than one troubled creature fell away from it and made for home, and safe lairs, and places where seeking-magic was stored. Bad times are better faced on the crumbling pages of tomes that relate histories of long, long ago-not as deadly events that tomorrow may bring.

The Castle of Shadows, Kythorn 6

Milhvar grew a long, tentacled arm that flattened into a leathery wing, and flapped it once. The power of his wing beat plucked him from his feet and took him a good way across the chamber. He noted approvingly that the cloak's gray and hard-to-see substance shifted shape along with him. His cloak of spells was truly a cloak of shadows, as suited to shifting as any of the blood of Malaug. Now to test it against the Chosen of Mystra, to see if the enchantments he'd devised truly held. The cloak must foil all magic wielded or cast by any sworn minion of Mystra, from her mortal Chosen to Azuth himself! If it proved able, the Chosen wouldn't be able to sense the approach of the Malaugrym… and perhaps his kin would have their revenge upon the hated Elminster at last!

Milhvar made a certain gesture. The cloak shrank away from him, rolled itself into a ball, and dwindled into a thing of wisps and tatters. Smiling faintly, he took it in his hand and headed for his favorite hiding place. His cloak of shadows was best kept secret until it had served him in winning far greater power in the ranks of the clan than he commanded now.