Kael's POV
I had been called many things over the course of my career.
Dangerous. Unreachable. Excessive. Cold. The council used phrases like 'difficult to align with standard protocol' and 'resistant to collaborative frameworks'.
These were the institutional language for someone who did what needed to be done without consulting the people who preferred to be consulted. Hunters who had worked alongside me used more direct vocabulary. Opponents used vocabulary I found broadly accurate.
But nobody had ever called me a distraction.
I sat at the desk in my office and looked at the window and the city looked back at me with the complete indifference it always had and I thought about that word.
I didn't think about the argument, not the full exchange, not the expression on his face when he said it or the way the sentence had arrived with more force than he had planned, the force of something that had been under pressure for longer than the conversation. It was just the word.
