Dear Gossips,

The British royals are carrying on the tradition set by Queen Elizabeth II and are currently in Scotland for the end of the summer. This is the first time that King Charles has been on holiday at Balmoral since he became monarch last year. Which is why, for appearance’s sake, Prince William and Catherine are also there.

While we’re talking about appearances though…

How about the appearance of Prince Andrew, who has been invited by his brother the king to join the family at Balmoral, and was seen on Sunday getting a ride to church with Will and Kate. This is no ordinary carpool. The royal PR machine might be embarrassingly out of touch but even they would be aware, in advance, of how people would read into this – which is how they want people to read into it: that even though he’s the family shame, he will continue to be protected by his family seal, just as it was when his mother was alive. Never mind his association with the dead rapist pedophile Jeffrey Epstein and his sex trafficking partner, Ghislaine Maxwell, currently in prison, or the accusations from multiple women alleging that he was a participant in the sex trafficking operation, and the reportedly multimillion dollar settlement that was reached with Virginia Roberts Giuffre, one of the Epstein survivors – he’s one of theirs. And pairing him to church with the two people they consider to be the superstars of the British monarchy right now, Will and Kate, was a choice.

Since the sighting of Andrew heading to church with Will and Kate, royal sources have been briefing media outlets all over the place to clarify that this does not mean that Andrew will return to royal duties. This was a show of royal unity but not a path to Andrew’s return as a working royal. Still, it’s a message that he has the king’s support and is not to be touched.

So congratulations are in order, I guess. Andrew has successfully grovelled his way into his brother’s good graces. The takeaway here, then, is that ass-kissing works on the king, a royal tradition if there ever was one.

Yours in gossip,

Lainey

Prince William Gossip

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