The castle in front of the Northumbrian army was already quite large, and Edgar was about to give the order for the whole army to prepare for the siege, when Ulf's troops returned from the front, and the knight shouted to the prince: "Poverel's bastard has escaped!" ”

In fact, the Normans had evacuated three days earlier, and William of Poverel, who had fled in the direction of Bedford as soon as he heard of the northern army's southward movement, had abandoned his fifty Norman knights and left with them. Soon, Edgar stroked the walls of Nottingham and looked at the tall fortifications, and for a moment he sighed to himself, "This is much stronger than York Castle." ”

Seeing that the Normans were well maintained in the fort, Edgar's mood gradually improved. While the English army was stationed in Nottingham, the Scottish army in the rear was still slowly moving south like a flowing glacier. The banner of the Lion King of Alba, the High King of Alba, was swept in the wind at the front of this great army, and the valiant warriors from all clans marched proudly across the land of England, many of whom had never gone so far to the south, and were full of curiosity about the dense forests, mountains, and idyllic countryside around them.

Three days later, reinforcements from the Earl of Moka, Hereward, and Caladoger of Glamorgan arrived almost at the same time as the Scots, and they were all surprised when they saw the golden dragon banner above Nottingham, and no one expected Edgar's advance to take the fortress so quickly, until the prince himself saw that the king of Alba and the others understood what had happened.

"My lord, our army has been gathered, and the armor and attack equipment have been cured, if William doesn't come again, we might as well go south to London." Count Moka suggested.

This suggestion was echoed by many samurai, including King Malcolm, and Edgar replied after a moment's silence: "London and Winchester are well fortified, and we may fall into more and more sieges when we enter Northampton, and at the same time on our right flank, and Henry of Beaumont is stationed in Warwick, and without taking this stronghold, the Normans of Mercia can threaten our rear." ”

Although he very much wanted to drink the Thames immediately, Prince Edgar decided to take a conservative route, Harold made a mistake that could not be repeated, the southern garrison had a large number of ports connected to Normandy, the other side was easy to mobilize, like Harold, first the logistics were not well prepared, resulting in having to evacuate from the Sussex coast, and then after the Great Northern War, the elite guards were too tired, and finally it was obviously unwise to fight the Normans in a decisive battle near the southern coast. Edgar was determined to set the front line of attack on the Thames and would never easily move south to Sussex and Wessex until he took control of the lands on the north bank.

The Earl of Northampton was the first to agree with this suggestion, and King Alba felt that it was too risky to go directly into enemy territory before Mercia had been fully conquered. So the military commanders decided to send Hereward's Lincolnshire militia to besiege Warwick first, and the rest of the main force to attack Northampton, sweep away the Norman forts along the way, and then attack Thames, forcing William to go north for a decisive battle.

Prince Edgar's flag bearer was a London Sain, the same name as King Harold's father, also named Godwin, a knight whose ancestors lived in Hertford, and now he followed the prince south, and his homeland is in sight. Knight Godwin was the first to hear the prince who walked out of the tent give the order to march towards Northampton, and in his excitement, he directly raised the dragon flag in his hand, and immediately the armored men outside the tent cheered. The High King of Alba had never directly admired the appearance of Edgar's army, and when he saw this weather, he couldn't help but exclaim, "The morale of your subordinates is very high. ”

Edgar nodded, smiled and replied to his brother-in-law, "They know that they are going to face off against the Franks, so naturally they are fighting high. ”

At this time, outside the port of Iu in Normandy, King William of England was once again preparing to cross the sea, he was full of energy and high spirits, but the Earl of Mortan behind him had a melancholy on his face. The scale of this expedition was significantly smaller than before, the Normans could only send 1,500 knights and more than 7,000 infantry, the defensive situation of the principality was much worse than before, and the unforeseen outcome of the war against England also made some French knights gradually lose interest in participating, the knights of Anjou and Aquitaine had basically disappeared from the ranks of the army, and there were still many Flemish people, but the Normans began to doubt the prospects in England, and the king was not aware of it at present, The Count of Mortan, however, noticed that many knights were talking more and more about the success of the Ottville family in Sicily. This sign of danger is not yet obvious, but as time progresses, the problem will worsen and become an internal problem in Normandy and England. In real history, even after the successful conquest of England, the Duke of Normandy and the kings of England still faced this problem, and William the Conqueror himself had to try to prevent the noble knights of the Duchy from participating in expeditions to Italy, Spain, and other regions. In the time of Henry I, the king was even concerned about the loss of the best knights, and on the eve of the Battle of Danshebrai, the royal edict forbade Bohemond of Taranto to enter the country to recruit knights.

King William was still confident in the war, believing that if he reached England with his army, the rebels and barbarians who had formed a makeshift group would quickly crush away, after all, he himself had not lost a single battle until now. The most prominent military commander of our time asked his younger brother, the Count of Mortan, "What kind of people do you think our enemies are?" ”

Earl Robert replied cautiously: "We are not familiar with the Scots, and we have heard that they are also warriors who dare to fight, and the English rebels can compete with us in the suburbs, so they should be regarded as strong enemies." ”

King William shook his head and commented, "Malcolm is nothing more than a mediocre man, with no experience in battle, not even as good as his father Duncan. ”

After a pause, the King of England added: "As for the English, you have seen the character of Moka in London; Volsiov is not bad, he is a talent in the next generation; And Gus Patrick, which can only be done because of people, is not enough...... Only Edgar of Wessex has repeatedly defeated our army since he entered the battle, and his blood is brave, and it is even more rare to win or lose without being surprised. It's just that I haven't seen his generals so far, and as far as I know, he is still just a horseman. ”

This comment gave Earl Robert a little more confidence that the Normans would never fail and that the current setbacks would eventually pass. Amid the sound of oars and sails, the Normans finally pulled anchor and set sail for the sand on the other side of the channel.