The next few days were easy ones for Ning Chen.

The Xuan Emperor had been shut up so long that the business of government had piled into a great heap, and he did not summon Ning Chen to the palace once in all that time.

Idleness came to Ning Chen so rarely... the one sour note was lying alone in an empty room at night.

He had already sent word to Mangzhou to tell Yudie and the others they could come home.

That day Ning Chen and Feng Qizheng were out in the courtyard playing with Lone Stride.

That brute Feng Qizheng really was born with the strength of a god — he wrestled Lone Stride, and Lone Stride was no match for him.

Gu Yichun came in.

"My lord prince, the Minister of War, Ji Mingchen, asks to see you!"

Ning Chen and Feng Qizheng went through to the front hall.

Ji Mingchen saw Ning Chen and hurried to make his bow.

Ning Chen had no patience for the courtesies. "Is the modao made?"

Ji Mingchen smiled. "I have not failed my charge!"

As he said it he had the constables who had come with him bring the thing forward.

The black cloth was unwrapped, and the modao showed its true face.

Ning Chen had designed a small mechanism into the haft: in use the two halves join into one, and there is no call to take them apart afterward, so the thing carries easily.

Ning Chen lined the haft up, and with a click the two halves locked together.

The blade ran ten feet, edged on both sides, and weighed upward of thirty pounds.

"Old Feng, come and try it!"

Feng Qizheng came over, took the modao up one-handed and carried it out into the courtyard... thirty-odd pounds of modao weighed nothing at all in his hand, and he swung it with a tiger's force behind it.

"What is this blade called? It sits well in the hand."

"It is called the modao... When the modao comes out, man and horse go to pieces!"

Feng Qizheng broke into…