 Perctarit, as soon as he returned to Italy, had to make an act of submission to the usurper before he could escape to the Franks of Neustria, who attacked Grimoald in 663.The new king, hated by Neustria because he was allied with the Franks of Austrasia, repulsed them at Refrancore, near Asti.Grimoald, who in 663 had also defeated an attempt to reconquer Italy by the Byzantine Emperor Constans II, exercised his sovereign powers with a fullness never attained by his predecessors.