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head from her knees and stared wildly around, wondering where she was, where the sword had gone.
    And then she felt the shard pressing, solid and warm, against her skin. She took a deep breath, and despite everything else that had happened that night, a deep relief, verging on joy, washed over her.
    She would sleep that night, real sleep. For the first time in two weeks.
    Wally , she thought as she rose to her feet, suddenly anxious to return home, knowing Aunt Phyllis must be worrying. I should go see Wally in the hospital....
    But then she yawned, a huge, jaw-creaking yawn that she couldn’t stop. No. Sleep was what she needed. Wally was safe, and he’d probably be out of the hospital tomorrow anyway. Flish might be there a little longer , she thought, and the guilt of what she had done tempered her relief at chasing away the demon. But after all, they’d attacked her – even though they had twice before seen what she could do. She’d only been defending herself.
    Nobody was killed. Nobody was seriously hurt. A couple of broken bones, maybe. They’ll be fine.
    And so will I, she thought, yawning again. With proper sleep, so will I.
    I’d better be. I have to find the next shard.
    She hoisted her backpack and set off down the alley that led home.
    ~~~
    Later that night, alone in his high-rise Toronto office, Rex Major read a new text message, and swore. Ariane had banished the demon he had sent to haunt her dreams. Somehow she had realized the first shard could be used to drive it away. And the demon’s fear of Excalibur was so great it would not return, even if Major commanded it to.
    Rex Major’s thumbs flew over his phone. He hit SEND. The coded message would return the demon to its own world, but with the reassurance that it had done its part well and could still have the girl as its reward once Excalibur was Merlin’s.
    That reassurance was important. Despite the power he had once had and hoped to have again, Major always tried to stay on the right side of demons.
    He returned his attention to the e-mail that had sent him rushing from the opera, an automated message sparked by the encounter of the second shard with one of the thin threads of magic his Excalibur server software had woven throughout the Internet.
    He often felt like a spider lurking at the centre of a vast web, waiting for the vibrations caused by insects landing on its strands. Computers were everywhere, and if they were connected to the Internet, they were, in some small way, connected to him. The smartphone Wally Knight had been carrying had alerted him to the presence of the Lady of the Lake in Wascana Lake in Regina. When the diamond miners in the Northwest Territories had dug down to the first shard, it had perhaps been another smartphone that, prompted by the sliver of magic within its software, had sent the automated notice to Major.
    And now, at last, he had received a similar message about the second shard. Nothing but an IP address, but that had been enough for him to determine it had originated somewhere in southern France. Now to home in on it....
    He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, called up the power that still leaked to him through the almost-sealed doorway dividing Earth and Faerie, and sent his mind flashing through the web he had created, across the Atlantic and deep into Europe. The effort sapped his strength, but he held on, pushing harder. The signal had come from... there ...and he could trace it back to...
    His awareness of his office crashed back. He straightened, rubbing the back of his neck. He glanced at the clock on his computer screen. Ten minutes , he thought bitterly. Ten minutes of effort , and I’m exhausted.
    He shook his head. His magic hadn’t lasted long enough for him to pinpoint the shard’s location, but at least he had the name of a nearby city. He would travel there. Closer to the shard, he might be able to sense it more clearly, or at least be ready to move quickly if it once more made its