A royal drama simmering with power, legacy, and enemies-too-close-for-comfort. At twenty-two, fresh from the polished halls of an elite American university, he returns to the Kingdom of Xylos expecting a throne and the deference that comes with it. Instead, he finds a funeral, a nation in mourning, and a mother with plans that don’t include handing over absolute power to her emotionally volatile son—not yet. Enter Arabella Stonecroft Sterling: brilliant, composed, and infuriatingly unshakable. The daughter of a distant cousin and a graduate of military school, she’s no ordinary noble. She’s an orphan, a strategist, and—most galling of all—Adrian’s newly appointed “advisor.” To Adrian, it’s an insult. To Arabella, it’s duty. As Queen Eleanor tightens her grip on tradition and protocol, Adrian is forced into humiliating compromises—relegated to the guest quarters, stripped of his royal suite, and made to answer to a girl he views as an outsider with too much power. But Arabella doesn’t flinch. She plays by the Queen’s rules, not Adrian’s, and she knows exactly how to navigate the brutal dance of court politics. When the two clash, it’s not just about power. It’s about identity, legacy, and the ghosts they’re both hiding beneath polished armor and sharp words. Every glance is a test, every lesson a battle of wills. But in a palace where loyalty is currency and secrets are weapons, it’s only a matter of time before desire and danger become indistinguishable. He’s the prince who thinks the kingdom is already his. She’s the woman who might be the only one fit to rule it. And the crown? It’s starting to tremble.