00:00Adrian stared at Maya's message, dread pooling in his stomach, as the 72-hour countdown Marguerite had just given them
00:07suddenly felt far shorter than it already was.
00:11Marcus, he said, already climbing into the car.
00:15Something's wrong here.
00:17Edmund's gone, and he took the original council documents with him.
00:21We need to get back to the palace immediately.
00:23What documents specifically?
00:25The formal legitimisation paperwork the council began drafting tonight.
00:31If Edmunds disappeared with the only physical copies, we have no official record left to actually grant him the recognition
00:37his mother is demanding.
00:39They will have to find Maya, pacing anxiously outside the council chamber.
00:44Tommy asleep in a nearby guest room under careful watch.
00:49King Frederick and Lord Bertrand, already deep and agitated conversation inside.
00:53When did he leave?
00:55Twenty minutes ago, maybe less.
00:58He said he needed air.
00:59That everything happening tonight was overwhelming.
01:03I should have gone with him.
01:04I should have realised.
01:06This isn't your fault.
01:08None of us fully trusted him yet either.
01:10Marcus pulled up the palace's internal camera feeds, tracking Edmunds' path from the council chamber to a service exit near
01:19the palace's eastern gardens.
01:21He didn't run.
01:22Look at his pace.
01:23He's not fleeing.
01:25He's moving with purpose, like he has somewhere specific to be.
01:29Where does that exit lead?
01:30Directly toward the visitor parking area.
01:33And according to the gate log, a car matching his description left the grounds twelve minutes ago, registered to Reverend
01:41Alcombe Kane.
01:42Why would he go to Reverend Kane?
01:44The Reverend is safely under palace protection now, isn't he?
01:49He was.
01:50Edmund knows exactly where Kane is being kept.
01:53If he's the only person besides Marguerite who fully understands the legal weight of that unfiled marriage certificate, then Edmund
02:01might be trying to use Kane's testimony to strengthen his own position, independent of whatever deal his mother is trying
02:08to negotiate.
02:09You think he's turning against her plan or against ours?
02:13I think we won't know until we find him.
02:17King Frederick, informed of Edmund's disappearance, immediately placed a call to the unlisted number Marguerite had used earlier that night.
02:26To everyone's surprise, she answered on the first ring, I wondered how long it would take someone to call me,
02:34your son is missing.
02:36Along with the original legitimization documents this council was preparing on his behalf, there was a long pause on the
02:43line, the first genuine silence Marguerite had allowed all night.
02:47That wasn't part of any plan I authorized, and for the first time, uncertainty crept into her composed voice.
02:55You're saying Edmund is acting entirely on his own now.
02:59I'm saying that I may have finally lost control of exactly the thing I spent twenty years trying so carefully
03:06to control.
03:07Marcus's remaining contacts reached the safe house within the hour, finding the modest rural property, quiet and undisturbed, no signs
03:16of forced entry, no struggle, simply an empty house,
03:21and a note left neatly on the kitchen table, addressed to whoever came looking.
03:26Marcus photographed it, and sent it immediately to the group back at the palace.
03:31Adrian read it aloud over the phone.
03:33I'm sorry for leaving without explanation.
03:35I spent tonight watching my mother negotiate my future, like a bargaining chip, exactly the way the crown has treated
03:43every inconvenient truth in this family for decades.
03:46I won't be used that way again, not even by someone who claims to love me.
03:51Reverend Cain has agreed to help me file a formal, independent legal claim to the throne based on my birthright,
03:57not as a gift the council grants out of political necessity, but as a right I intend to prove for
04:03myself on my own terms.
04:05He's not trying to expose the family, he's trying to force his way into the succession directly, through legal claim
04:12rather than council recognition.
04:15Which means we may now be facing an actual contested succession claim, filed independently, completely outside the council's controlled process.
04:24If Edmund files this claim publicly, before we can negotiate a resolution, the 72-hour deadline his mother gave us
04:33becomes almost irrelevant.
04:34The scandal explodes regardless of anything we do next.
04:38Can he actually win a claim like that?
04:41Legally, given everything we've already confirmed tonight about his birthright and the king's own admission,
04:48yes, he very well might.
04:50Adrian sat quietly for a long moment, processing the weight of what this meant,
04:56not just for the crown, but for his own place within it.
04:59So recently thrown into question by Marguerite's surrogate revelation,
05:03let him try.
05:05Everyone turned toward him in surprise.
05:08If Edmund has a legitimate claim, if the Lord genuinely supports his right to be recognized,
05:14then maybe the answer isn't to fight him or negotiate around him.
05:17Maybe it's to finally actually stand beside him, instead, publicly, not because Marguerite forced it,
05:25and not because a deadline demands it, but because it's the right thing to do, regardless of the political cost.
05:31King Frederick studied his son for a long moment, something unreadable passing behind his tired eyes.
05:37That's a noble sentiment.
05:39But there's something you don't yet understand about Edmund's specific claim, Adrian,
05:45and I should have told you the moment Marguerite revealed the surrogate document tonight.
05:50What is it?
05:51The king hesitated, glancing toward Lord Bertrand,
05:55who nodded gravely, as though confirming some decision already reached between them.
06:00If your birth truly was arranged through a surrogate procedure,
06:04and Edmund is proven to be my only biologically confirmed son,
06:09then under the strictest reading of Belmore's succession law,
06:12a successful claim from Edmund wouldn't simply add him to the line of succession beside you.
06:18He paused.
06:19The weight of the sentence settling heavily in the room,
06:22it could replace you entirely.
06:24Coming up in episode 25,
06:27Replaced.
06:28As the true legal stakes of Edmund's claim become clear,
06:31Adrian must confront the possibility of losing everything he was raised to inherit,
06:36just as he's finally found the family worth fighting for.
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