The past can often be erased by means of remorse, restraint or forgetting. —Wilde

A week before Michael's Day, Bishop Stigander of Chichester and Abbot St. Augustine died, and soon Queen Mother Agatha began to cough up blood.

Edgar, who was arranging a fleet to the south, hurried back to Westminster and sent messengers to Scotland at the same time, most of the Queen Mother's siblings were far away in the East, but Vladimir, the eldest son of the Grand Duke of Kiev, was a guest in England at this time, and after the end of the Saxon War, Prince Vladimir and his wife Gisha visited London together, so they came with the king to visit the Queen Mother.

Madame Agatha had no impression of the braided Prince Rurik, who left Kiev when Vladimir's mother was a purple-robed princess in Constantinople. But she was no stranger to Vladimir's wife, the fact that Gisha was the daughter of Harold Godwinson, much to the displeasure of the Queen Mother.

But Lady Gisa was not only with her husband this time, but Count Godwin's daughter, Grandma Gonhilda, whose days were numbered, and the beautiful Lady Gisa trembled and fell to her knees in front of the sickbed, and asked the Queen Mother for permission to enter the convent to see her only remaining aunt, and in an instant, the girl kneeling before her reminded the Queen Mother of her eldest daughter, Margaret.

"Go, child, the old man should not leave the world alone, and God will want you to comfort her."

The reception ended in sobbing, and at the insistence of the Queen Mother, Princess Christina, who was serving beside her, also left the room with tears in her eyes, leaving the King alone.

"Is my Maggie here?"

"Don't worry, mother, I've sent the fastest boat to Perth, and my sister will be there soon." Edgar sighed secretly, Margaret is the eldest daughter of her father, and her mother named her after the Greek "pearl", and she has been very fond of since she was a child, and she married her beloved pearl to King Malcolm, who is middle-aged and has a group of children, which has always been a regret in her mother's heart.

"I wish I could see my Maggie one last time." Lady Agatha's heart was aching at this time, and she said with force, "It is not easy to hear that she is now the mother of eight children......

Child, people who have been bedridden for a long time often confuse insomnia with dreams that are too deep, but I can still see Maggie's life before her birth, as if it was happening right in front of my eyes—I can see your father, who was always afraid of being assassinated by the Hungarians, because he helped my brother-in-law fight for the throne, so he leaned against the bed all night in armor - Maggie's birth was the only consolation God gave us, your father was not as old as you are now, and he was nervous like a child in and out of the delivery room, until he picked up Maggie and put Maggie's fingers in his beard, When touching his cheekbones, your father said that from now on this is his most precious pearl, and for her it is all worth it! ”

Edgar saw that his mother was speaking more and more slowly, almost muttering reminiscences, and tried to interrupt several times, but finally he couldn't bear it.

"Later, my brother-in-law finally became king, and it didn't take long for you and Christie to be born, and the days of exile became sunny......"

"Until one day, your father said to me that we could finally return home, and on that day, how happy our family was, and no one knew how cruel fate would be.

In Germany, I began to realize the change in your father, you started to get sick halfway through, your whole body was swollen, your forehead was hot like charcoal, and your father was circling that Harold every day, with only his throne in his eyes, and no one around us!

At that time, the whole empire was mourning for Emperor Henry, and the priests were called to the Rhineland to attend the emperor's funeral, and there was no one who knew how to heal, and I prayed every day that God would not take you away, and Maggie herself went to fetch water to feed you. Lady Agatha seemed to remember something, and her eyes showed resentment, "and when your fever had subsided, Harold told your father that he had found a Germanic monk of great medical skill and intended to leave you in his care. But the empire was in chaos at that time, and what serious monk would be found by Harold by chance? I felt that things were not good, but I could not do anything, it was Maggie who cried in front of your father for three days, her eyes were swollen, and finally awakened a little of his father's memory in his increasingly cold heart, Harold's plot did not succeed, until we arrived in Flanders, your illness was completely cured, but your father began to curry favor with the Flemish and Normans again, and sent himself into the vulture's claws, until he turned into a corpse and appeared in front of my eyes, and in those days, only Maggie helped me take care of you and Christie. ”

"I understand, mother, I swear with my life that no matter what happens in the future, I will take care of my sister and her children." Edgar's eyes gradually moistened, although the child Margaret protected thirty years ago was not his current self, but the Margaret who swore to protect her brother to the death had never changed, twenty years ago, if it wasn't for Margaret's sacrifice in exchange for reinforcements from the Scots, perhaps he would have been captured by the Normans.

"Remember the sword I gave you?" Lady Agatha asked suddenly.

"Remember, you said that it was the sword of King Offa, a relic left by my grandfather."

"Actually, that sword was left by your grandfather's eldest brother."

Edgar rarely heard of this prince, and after the Norman invasion, everyone liked to use the example of Edmund the Brave to inspire him to resist as valiantly as his grandfather, and even the struggle between King Edmund and his stepmother, Queen Emma of Normandy, was used by some of the priests of Winchester to accuse the Norman forces of polluting the kingdom, but in Lady Agatha's subsequent narrative, Edgar heard another story:

King Ethelred's eldest son, Etherstein, was originally the darling of the whole territory and the heir of the kingdom, but he and his father had increasingly serious differences over the treatment of Danish subjects, and after the St. Brysday's massacre, the Danish subjects of the kingdom were bloody, and Prince Ethelstein went into exile in the north, accepted the allegiance of the lord of Danfa and began to wage war against the king. Edgar's grandfather, Edmund the Brave, was among the lords who swore allegiance to Prince Etherstein.

The father-son civil war weakened England, and when the king invaded, the king had no choice but to go into exile, and Prince Etherstein died on the run, giving the arcane sword left by the king to his brother Edmund on his deathbed.

Under the influence of Winchester scholars, Edgar always believed that the great traitor Edric County Governor assassinated the two lords of the Seven Castles on Edmund's orders, and then Edmund seized Siggiforth's widow.

However, in his mother's account, the magistrate of Edric is always carrying out the king's will, just as he did in the assassination of the Count of Northumbria, and King Ethelred is the real mastermind, and as for Sigivus and Moka of the Seven Castles, they were not killed for defecting to the Danes, but because they were the main supporters of Prince Etherstein, and the king chose not to forgive after returning home.

Etherstein is dead, and Prince Edmund, the brave sees what happened to the two county chiefs, realizes that reconciliation is hopeless, so he will take the widow of Siggiphes from Edric, the purpose of this robbery is to keep Ethelstein's roots in the north so that he can continue his brother's rebellion.

The father-son feud reignited, and Canute took the opportunity to invade, which eventually led to the collapse of the Wessex dynasty. The cruel and unrelated King Ethelred died in London, the Governor of Edric, who was afraid of being liquidated by the king's son, took refuge with the Danes, after the Battle of Ortford, the wind seemed to be unfavorable to Cnut, so Edric privately reconciled with Edmund and temporarily took refuge in his former rival, and in the following Battle of Asanton, the Lord of Edric finally chose to betray Edmund, and the young King Canute took the opportunity to slaughter many of the Thanes in England, and the survivors who were bloodied by the Danish spears failed to keep the south, King Etherstein slew the Five Kings and Seven Yars at Brunanburg before finally unified England fell.

"That's how your ancestors lost their country." Lady Agatha finally said, "Your father once said to me that your grandfather did not scold the capricious magistrate of Mercia in his last days like the others, but remorseed the rebellion of his brother Etherstein, and said that the foundations of the kingdom always rot from within, and that family discord is the greatest bane of the dynasty. If it weren't for this civil strife, Alfred's descendants would not have been defeated by the Danes, and if King Ethelred had forgiven his son, Edric would not have tarnished the royal family with the blood of the two county governors and destroyed the trust between the bloodlines.

I've seen too many ups and downs to see that Maggie's husband is making the same mistakes, and it seems that Duncan's children and grandchildren will not be able to escape this catastrophe after all, and remember to protect Maggie and her children when the war comes. As for what will happen to your descendants, it's hard for me to predict, and I hope your children won't be like my broken brothers, who have permanently weakened the Rurik family as your ancestors. ”

Three days later, a dragon-headed white boat sailed across the turbulent Tyne, and a nun in a black veil looked thoughtfully at the south bank, her newfound freedom breathing back into life in her withered body, even though she had long been accustomed to looking down on the walls and waves from the top of the tower, the calmest sight in the world still made her heart flutter, and when she saw the purple and gold insignia of the Northumbria knight again, she felt long-lost tears run down her cheeks like mercury. The moment she was spiritually free, her soul eyes saw a boy with black hair and a hook-billed raven with black feathers hovering above his head, and the corpses around him seemed to be constantly vomiting out of the earth, gradually engulfing everything.

"Thankfully, the kid finally fell asleep."

"Why did you refuse the king?" She suddenly asked, "You know he's not willing to let Edward go at a time like this. ”

"Malcolm can force his clan, but Edward can't afford to be the Tanist (the Gaelic heir to the throne, which must be filled by an adult male royal family), this election will not give him any power, and I will not turn my son into a corpse!"

She knew it all, she had seen her father's cold, speechless body, she had prevented the same thing from happening to her brother, and this time she would prevent it from happening again.

"All mothers think so, but when has fate been manipulated by the tears of mothers?" Glouoh sighed, she couldn't help but be jealous of Margaret for what she had lost.

"Don't be sad, my friend, this time I will beg him, not only for my children, but also for you." The Queen of Scotland assured.

"Even if he agrees, my brother will not agree, Marsnekta, like my dead husband, and yours, men always value inheritance more."

"Then we have to find your child first!"

"Kenneth is my grandmother's son, though only an illegitimate child, but he is much more competent as a bodyguard than Marsnekta, otherwise a blacksmith's son would not be my husband's cronies, Angus is safer by his side than by my brother's side, and I don't want that to change until the storm in the highlands subsides!"

Malcolm won't be relentless, and if he finds your son, it's over.

She remembered Marsnekta's words, and the anger in that voice could burn the whole world, and she looked at the queen again, knowing that she might one day be incited by her brother to betray this friend, but the thought of this made her eyes begin to glow:

God, I hate so much.