All Chapters of Bound To The Crown Prince: Chapter 41 - Chapter 47

(Edrian’s POV)The first scream tore through the palace like a blade through silk.I was already moving before my mind caught up, Kael’s words still echoing in my skull… assassins… inside these walls… before dawn. The corridor outside Xander’s chambers exploded into noise, boots pounding stone, steel ringing, and the sharp crack of doors thrown open.“Xander!” I shouted, shoving the door wide.He was on his feet in an instant, bare-chested, and his eyes blazing gold as the bond snapped taut between us. We felt it at the same time how wrong this is.“Assasins are here,” I said.“I know,” he replied, already reaching for his blades. His voice was calm, I became scared of how calm it was, the kind that came when the beast in him had taken the rein. “Stay behind me.” He said “Not a chance.” I answered. The first assassin came through the window.Glass shattered inward, moonlight spraying across the room as a figure rolled. He rose with twin daggers flashing, he had a black mask on, but

(Xander’s POV)The palace did not sleep after Amber fell.Walls groaned under the weight of magic burned away. Torches hissed as rain crept through shattered arches. Blood... too much blood ran in thin veins along the marble, carrying the echoes of screams that had not yet faded.I stood in the High Court with my sword lowered, chest heaving, and my wolf still half-risen beneath my skin. The bond between me and Edrian thrummed alive, steady, and furious... anchoring me while the kingdom threatened to tear itself apart.Kael stepped into the circle of light as if he owned it.He always had a way of doing that...entering like the ending was already written in his favor.“My brother,” he said mildly, his boots crunching over glass. “You look tired.”Guards poured in behind him. Too many. Cloaked figures with blades that are still wet with blood. The last of the assassins he’d hidden in plain sight were captains, courtiers, men who had sworn oaths to my father and broken them with smiles.

(Edrian’s POV)The first law Xander signed was written in ink the color of fresh earth.I stood beside him in the council chamber, the table scarred with centuries of fists and blades, and watched his hand move steadily across the parchment.“All bonds of enslavement within DarkMoonCrest are dissolved.”The words seemed to glow when the seal pressed down and for a heartbeat, it seems everyone held their breath, then the room exhaled at the same timeSome of the nobles stiffened, those whose wealth had been built on backs and broken wills but none dared speak. Not with Xander seated at the head of the table, even the Abyssal Throne was quiet behind him, its hunger was gone.“Effective immediately,” Xander said, his voice calm but strong. “Those who resist will answer to me.”A murmur rippled through the chamber, I’m not sure if it’s fear, anger, relief, or hope, maybe all tangled together.I felt it like a tide in my chest.Afterward, when the hall emptied and the doors closed, Xander

(Kael’s POV)The cold here is different.It doesn’t bite like mountain frost or creep like palace stone. It seeps. It crawls under skin and settles in the bones, a reminder that nothing here was built for comfort or mercy.Rogue lands.They call it freedom, but I call it rot.I sit near a dying fire, its was flames weak, but its smoke was stinging my eyes. Around me, wolves linger in the half-dark…scarred, feral, and they’re watching me with the same suspicion they reserve for prey that might still bite back. They know who I was, but they don’t care.A fallen prince is still a body that bleeds.The crown is gone, the palace is gone, even my name feels thinner here, it has been stripped of the weight it once carried. Kael of DarkMoonCrest. Heir apparent.Exile tastes like ash.They took everything from me.No…. he did.Xander.Golden heir, beloved king, chosen by the abyssal throne and Moon and fate itself. He always had the things that mattered handed to him on a platter…loyalty, rev