Wiglaf actually knew that there were pursuers behind him. The defeat of his Mercian army was not due to his own incompetence, but because the enemies in the big ships were too strong!
That’s the Vikings? They actually formed an alliance with Northumbria!
A full-scale war seemed imminent. He escaped with the remaining soldiers, but he lost too many supplies and the morale of the soldiers was poor. The escape was also a long and slow journey.
When he was about to arrive at the Birmingham military camp, he sent messengers to several key lords to order them to organize troops and arrive in Birmingham immediately.
The king's decree that the messenger received was quite extreme, requiring the lord who received the letter to deploy an unlimited number of troops regardless of any means.
Why?
Wiglaf’s original words were simple and outrageous: “The kings of Northumbria betrayed their faith. They cooperated with the barbarians, which was tantamount to making a deal with the devil. They planned to kill all the Mercians. ."
There were not many horses, so the messenger galloped wildly.
The Shrewsbury nobles were the first to receive the king's request for help. Although the earl thought this was strange, he had never seen the king so anxious, so he began to organize troops.
The messenger continued to deliver the news and rushed to Worcester and Oxford...
The noble army Wiglaf was too far away and could not be counted on for the time being. His exhausted division finally arrived at the Birmingham barracks and finally received valuable supplies.
Only after arriving here, Wiglaf, who had been escaping all the way, had time to calm down.
He asked the soldiers left behind: "How is Tamworth now? How about Nottingham?"
However, the few defenders who had been hit by the recent heavy rain were not willing to go out to explore. road.
Wiglaf couldn't figure out the reason. Thinking that he had escaped quickly enough in the rain, he thought that his enemies were also facing the same dilemma.
Before he fell asleep, he ordered his men to arrest all men over the age of twelve in nearby villages, order them to immediately serve in the army and report to Birmingham with their own food.
However, the next day, when the exhausted and defeated army had just staggered to sleep in the king's camp for a night, and their energy had not yet been restored, an army hurried over in the mist.
The soldiers were on alert, and when they discovered that they were the Earl of Leicester's army, alert became contact.
I heard that reinforcements have arrived, which is undoubtedly good news after the rain has passed and the weather has cleared up!
Wiglaf happily received the Earl of Leicester and praised him enthusiastically: "It seems that you have received my order. You are indeed a loyal minister of the kingdom."
Lester The count's face looked down, even his beard looked desolate.
The earl could not conceal his grief and indignation, and then cried loudly: "Your Majesty! Tamworth, it has been..."
"What did you say?"
< p>"Tamworth has been surrounded by an army! The capital is in danger! Many people are fleeing.""You...are you kidding?? "Wiglaf's face turned pale in an instant, and he suppressed a giggle for a long time.
"It's absolutely true, I swear to God. My armies are powerless to defeat them, and I am looking for yours. Your Majesty, it is so good that you are not in Tamworth. "
"Okay? My prince! My canary! "Wiglaf stamped his feet angrily, and he almost fainted.
But reason still prevailed. He didn't believe that the Northumbrians were moving so fast. Wait, what if it was a Viking? Human?
It shouldn’t be! The Vikings shouldn’t be so fast.
Wiglaf believes that there is an enemy standing under the capital wall, Tamworth should say. If it's trouble, it shouldn't be fatal.
He asked casually: "How many soldiers did you bring? "
"Three hundred people. ”
“Why so little?” It's simply not enough. ”
“Your Majesty, my strength is very weak. "
Wiglaf shook his head. He felt that Earl Leicester was pretending to be weak.
"It doesn't matter. Three hundred men is not a small number. I will wait for two more days until the Earl of Shrewsbury arrives with his troops, and we can join forces and go to Tamworth together. ”
Wiglaf is still quite optimistic so far. He trusts his prince Botwulf to guard the city, and he is eager to let Mary, the little slave who plays the role of daughter, kneel in single clothes. Sing a little song by your side.
The so-called Queen Mary is indeed not Wiglaf’s daughter, but is actually the product of the queen’s adultery. Wiglaf and the queen were in a purely political marriage, and the two gave birth to Botwu. Wolf completed his mission. As for his future success in becoming king, he forgave his wife who became the queen in order to avoid scandal, but the anger was difficult to heal, and this anger was vented on poor Mary. She has grown into a beautiful maid and an interesting canary.
Poor Mary, if Wiglaf also dies, the secret of her true identity will die with everyone who knows it. Lost forever in history.
The Birmingham Barracks is not far from Tamworth. This is the barracks on the left bank of the Tamworth River, and the capital is on the right bank.
There are scouts heading straight to Tamworth. Thinking about it, they saw a shocking scene from a distance. They rushed all night with extremely bad information and informed the king. King Wiglaf was so angry that he drew his sword.
" Are you lying to me? Damn crows, I'm going to kill you! "
The scout knelt down and cried, covering his heart and swearing to God that he was not lying.
"Maybe they are telling the truth. "The Earl of Leicester also spoke with trepidation, "I took in the refugees and saw the barbarians attacking the city. "
"What else did you see? "Wiglaf calmed down his anger and asked the scout again.
"I saw many enemies and many big ships. "
Another scout said: "I saw the flags on those big ships, and they looked exactly like our flags. Those enemies are clearly there in large numbersThe people who attacked us in Le Village..."
"Were they Vikings? hateful! "Wiglaf was furious with deep fear. He never dreamed that a large number of barbarian flags could still fly on the walls of his capital. This is a shameful thing for the queen to commit adultery.
The war with Northumbria is no longer the main conflict. The worst-case scenario is that if his capital is attacked, won't his wealth and royal power be shaken?
No, is he? Already killed in battle?
Wiglaf is eager to lead his troops to regain Tamworth, because this humiliation is worse than surrendering to Wessex.
Life here. At the lowest point, an army appeared like an angel descending!
It was the Earl of Shrewsbury and his army of more than 600 people! They had been guarding the west of the kingdom and fighting against the old Britons in Wales for many years! Veterans.
Indeed, Earl Shrewsbury's soldiers are well-equipped, and many Mercians call them well-trained, and their strength is only inferior to Wiglaf's elite soldiers. Naturally, there is a saying that Shrewsbury's soldiers are well-equipped. As long as there is a reason, the Earl of Lee family can compete for the throne of Mercia at the right time.
However, when the Earl learned of the disaster in the capital, most of his arrogance had dissipated.
Wiglaf. He couldn't care too much anymore, so he used strong tactics to recruit more than 500 people from several nearby villages.
All reinforcements, headquarters troops, military camp defenders, and farmers combined. , an army with a strength of nearly 4,000 people was born!
So many men gathered together, and the spears were like a dense forest.
Although many of the spearheads were rusty, one of them was rusty. There are also some sharpened wooden poles and wooden pitchforks, and even flails for threshing and grass-cutting scythes.
There are all kinds of weapons. Such a force has restored Wiglaf's confidence.
p>He stood on a high ground in the military camp, suppressing his anger and giving orders to the gathered crowd.
"The Northumbrians have betrayed their faith! They signed a contract with the devil who came across the sea! "
"The hateful enemy sneak attacked our army and is now attacking our Tamworth! ”
“Mercians! I order you to take up arms! This is not a fight for me! The most ordinary farmer, you are now the sergeant of the kingdom. You have to fight for your wives and children, for wealth and glory. "
"Don't think that these wars have nothing to do with you! The Northumbrian army who signed a contract with the devil are already monsters! They will eat everything that moves, make vegetation wither and turn yellow, and turn cattle and sheep into skeletons. They will also steal your souls. If we don't defeat them, we will all fall into hell! "
Wiglaf talked a lot, and his words also contained many curses and threats.
The gathered army was frightened, and because of fear, their morale improved strangely.
The territory of Mercia is naturally larger than that of Northumbria, and its population is also larger than the former. If Wiglaf is given enoughDuring this period, he could indeed bring out 10,000 warriors, which in this era was almost equivalent to an "astronomical number" of troops to fight against any attacker.
What he is doing now is almost gambling with his royal power.
Yes, what else can be lost? If a king who has lost Tamworth renounces it, he will automatically abdicate. Unless he leads his army to fight hard and save Tamworth, the king's power can continue to be stable.
Because Wiglaf was a military noble before he became king, his early years of being forced to surrender to the King of Wessex had already disgraced him. The successful restoration did not restore his old fortunes, and now he knew that he had to fight hard.
Wiglaf's patchwork army began to advance towards Tamworth.
At the same time, the Rus, Balmoks and Northumbrian troops were actively dividing the spoils of Tamworth.
Rurik estimated that he had plundered one million pounds of wheat in Tamworth alone, plus the oats he plundered in York, there was no problem in plundering 1.5 million pounds of grain.
Even so, he threw a batch of grain to the Balmoks who were about to launch a large-scale immigration.
Grain of this scale is roughly equivalent to 580 tons.
This can be called an extreme number, but Rurik is completely justified.
The Avora-class sailing cruiser is more than enough to carry one hundred tons of cargo!
The Duke of Ostara and the Spellosvilia, two ships directly shipped one-third of all captured wheat!
With so much cargo stuffed into their smooth and thick hulls, the sleeping depth in the Tam River dropped by nearly one meter.
Fortunately, this river is not a stream. Its channel can easily drown people, and it can actually float a fully loaded ship.
Rurik’s fleet, the most numerous armed forces It is normal for a cargo ship to transship thirty tons of wheat. These cargo ships alone are enough to carry the wheat back home.
The Balmoks were busy selecting slaves from the captives, and King Aynred of Northumbria was eager to control the refugees. Rurik's plundering of the population really didn't look like a Viking, but Queen Mary and the one hundred and twenty women must be taken away. This also includes the captured old priest of Lindsay Abbey, who will be escorted to Ross.
In fact, Rurik could already take his men and run away with the loot, because it was already September.
However, he could not just go back to his hometown to spend the winter. Due to practical reasons, he had to wait for the Balmoks and then evacuate together.
Because some supplies belonging to Ross are still thrown in the Narvik Fjord in the far north, especially a large amount of good salt, which needs to be taken away.
It was September after all, and Rurik knew that he didn’t have much time left. Thousands of Balmoqs could spend the winter in Britain, but not themselves.
In the tent, he discussed with his cousin Arik and decided to split into two groups when he returned home.
"Ask me to be the leader of escorting supplies? This...isn't this a Sorgon voyage?" Arik was a little surprised.
"I really have no choice. Our army's war in Britain has come to an end. The people back home need a lot of wheat, and our grain transport fleet must arrive before the sea freezes."
p>"That's the truth. But you have to go to the Balmok people's hometown again? You will have to sail for at least twenty days more!" Arik said that it was inappropriate.
"This is to announce to them that we Russians are reliable allies. Besides, I have to bring back that salt, and I can buy more salt. Brother, we must seize the opportunity."
"Why?"
"I'm afraid that the Balmoks will no longer be interested in making salt after they start farming. We must seize the opportunity to reserve more salt."< /p>
Arik kept scratching his head. To be honest, he was eager to go home. Since his brother was so determined, he had no complaints.
Arik never worried about any of Rurik's voyages. A brave man is not afraid of the sea. His brother is also blessed by God. The storm on the sea cannot capsize Rurik's ship. It will only Help it go crazy.
The agreement was to wait for three more days, but in fact on the second day, seeing that the world was already safe, the Russians went all out to load the wheat onto the ship, and were using leverage to transport the wheat quickly in rope net bags. Wheat grains in sacks.
This night, the Ross warriors and the mercenaries gathered around the campfire again. After eating wheat rice, they fell asleep to recuperate from the work of transporting supplies.
As for the captured women who learned their fate, they could only keep sobbing, while some cheered up and felt that the days ahead in a new place should not be too bad.
Only the brain-damaged princess Mary felt a strange joy when she saw the corpse of her brother whose head was half cut off and his head turned into a winner's bowl.
She took the initiative to have an extremely intimate relationship with Rurik, trying her best to please the boy and herself.
She wished she could get pregnant and give birth to a child soon, so that her descendants could continue to hold the title of Mercian nobles and open up new territories in the future. Because, although he was in a state of decline, Rurik of Rus and his powerful principality continued to support his noble status.
Because this is the revenge of Princess Mary.
She was taking revenge on her father. She used this method to overthrow the rule of King Wiglaf and his male heir, and then replaced her with Rurik's son. This was the ultimate revenge.
What a sad princess. She still doesn’t know her identity. It is precisely the members of the royal family who kept silent about the scandal, and the rest of the insiders were physically wiped out into ashes. Mary had no idea that the humiliation she suffered did involve an original sin.
Living in the moment for the time being, she really felt that Rurik was really a holy boy. He was exuding the fragrance of flowers (using special soap) and there was no dirt on his body.With golden hair and a handsome face, what woman wouldn’t be tempted?
Compared with bluntly speaking, as a noble, he is really unclean. But instead of complaining, Rurik behaved like a bull in April, and having sex with him made Princess Mary feel like a woman for the first time, rather than a sinful canary.
She is commendable for her self-awareness. She knows that she can attract the attention of Rurik of Rus not because of her skin, but because of her status as a top noble in Mercia and her ability to speak Latin fluently. The most important thing is actually the latter. She has basically figured out what happened after she was "abducted" to the Principality of Ross - becoming a Latin teacher.
But things have changed.
A very small-scale encounter occurred in the evening.
It was Balmok who wanted to make a tooth sacrifice. He took a bow and went to the forest on the other side of the river to try to hunt some hares. As a result, he encountered a scout from the Mercian army.
Although the Mercian scouts tried their best to escape, one of them was captured after falling down from an arrow.
Why do the strange soldiers appear here? Feeling that something was amiss, the Balmoks went through many twists and turns before bringing the prisoners back to the riverside camp near dawn the next day.
A new prisoner appears? The sudden situation made the knowledgeable people in the Viking coalition instinctively take precautions. Everyone was a veteran on the battlefield, and they all felt the impending murderous intent. The so-called captives easily confessed everything - the army of Mercia was coming in a mighty force!
At dawn, the world is still immersed in mist, the sun rises lazily, and the golden light illuminates the world like a sanctuary.
The Russians, Balmoks, mercenaries, and even the Northumbrian army, the mixed coalition has no time to linger now.
The Northumbrians blew the trumpets, as did the Rus and Balmoq.
Because the captured scouts deliberately exaggerated the strength of the Mercian army, claiming that there were at least 10,000 troops.
Ten thousand soldiers? Rurik subconsciously couldn't believe it, but after Eynred's description, he somewhat believed it.
"Since the enemy has so many troops, are you afraid?" Rurik asked the broken-arm Eynred with a deliberately contemptuous attitude.
It is impossible to say that you are not afraid. As a king, Eynred still bites the bullet and says that he is not afraid.
It was this answer that made Rurik and Magnut work together.
“Let the main force of your army cross the river and fight them!” Rurik stated his position to Eynred on behalf of the Viking coalition. “After all, this belongs to Northumbria and Mercia. In war, whether we help depends on our mood."
"But this is not in line with the treaty!" Eynred tried to argue.
"No! We only signed a non-aggression treaty. Don't worry, I won't sit back and watch your army be wiped out. Besides, Tamworth is their capital, Mercians and you It's natural to work hard. Unless you renounce Central Mercia, including Tamworth, and future rule over the areas of Perkseter and Chester. "Rurik said this, and Eynred could only bite the bullet and order his army to pass through the temporary pontoon bridge built by the Viking coalition.
Just as the various sergeants of the Northumbrian Army were halfway across, Suddenly, a flag flew from the low hills in the distance.
It was the Mercian army, they were coming.