Prince Harry sat in the third row for his father King Charles' Coronation as sitting next to his estranged brother Prince William was "impossible", say experts.
Despite being the monarch's son as well as fifth in line to the throne, Harry, who attended the Coronation alone, was placed several rows back at Westminster Abbey.
It meant he had no interaction with his older brother nor his sister-in-law the Princess of Wales - and instead sat with Princess Eugenie, her husband Jack Brooksbank and the elderly Princess Alexandra.
Harry also chatted to his cousin Princess Beatrice and her husband Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi as he entered the church on Saturday in the drizzling UK rain.
However, any were left wondering why Harry wasn't given a more prominent seat closer to the action to see his father crowned.
But speaking on True Royalty TV's The Royal Beat, Vanity Fair's royal editor Katie Nicholl, said it wasn't a coincidence.
She explained: "It was a deliberate seating plan that would have been overseen and approved.
Harry is not a working member of the Royal Family anymore. You couldn't have put Harry alongside the Waleses, for the reasons we all know. It would have been impossible."
Meanwhile, The Sun's royal editor Matt Wilkinson added: "The seating plan was agreed quite late, and I don't think Harry had much input; [it was a] 'sit me wherever you put me' type thing. You couldn't have put him next to the Waleses.
"Putting Harry with Princess Beatrice, Jack, Princess Eugenie. Harry was among friends and could have had private conversations with them."
After the service, there was no time for the brothers to reconcile as Harry headed straight to Heathrow via a reported brief stop at Buckingham Palace to race back to California.
He was pictured at the London airport still in his suit and medals before jetting back to his home, where son Archie was celebrating his fourth birthday.
It comes after another royal author claimed that Harry and Meghan's feud with William and Kate will "never be healed".
The Coronation was the first time the two warring brothers had been seen at the same event since the release of Harry's controversial memoir Spare.
And now Tom Quinn, the author behind the book Gilded Youth: An Intimate History of Growing Up in the Royal Family, says the rift between the two couples is potentially too deep to fix.
He told the Express : "People I've spoken to who work for both William and Kate say this is never really going to be healed.
"Privately there's a lot more anger than there is publicly, especially about the accusation William physically assaulted Harry. Apparently, William is furious."
The Royal Beat - available on True Royalty TV.
