"And what was She, the fairy Melusine?
                        Men say, at night, around the castle keep
                        The black air ruffles neath the outstretched vans
                        of a long flying worm, whose sinewy tail
                        and leather pinions beat the parted sky
                        scudding with puddered clouds black as soot,
                        and ever and again a shuddering cry
                        mounts on the wind, a cry of pain and loss,
                        and whirls in the wind's screaming
                        and is gone."

                              --A. S. Byatt, Possession