" I’m sorry you had to lie to that fisher,” Karish muttered.
So was I. I was committed to the story now, and there was no backing out of it. I was going to have nightmares about everyone finding out that we’d been blowing windless. But it was done. “I didn’t have to lie. I wasn’t lying. We are working on it, remember? This was part of the deal.”
He looked at me. “You felt you were lying to him, and with you that’s all that counts.”
I shrugged. “Then I’ll just have to get over my delicate sensibilities, won’t I? And you’ll have to figure out some way to fix things.”
He grunted. “Lucky me.”
I almost winced. That had been careless, and thoughtless, and stupid. Let’s just pile a bit more pressure on him, shall we?
I widened my eyes at him, though the effect may have been ruined by the scarves wrapped around my face. “But Taro,” I said in a lilting voice, “You’re my hero.”
He groaned.
I swallowed down a laugh. “You’re everyone’s hero.”
“Shut up, Lee.”
“The Darling of the Triple S.”
“That wasn’t my fault!”
That made me pause for a moment. That wasn’t his fault? What exactly did that mean? “The hope of High Scape.”
“Will you stop?”
“Defeater of the evil Stevan Creol and favorite of the Empress Constia.” I was kind of getting into this. He squirmed so well.
“I swear if you don’t stop I’ll . . .”
“What?” I challenged him.
“Do something you don’t like,” he muttered.
As threats went, that was a little weak. “Like what?
From the way his eyes crinkled up I knew he was grinning behind the wraps around his face. And didn’t that send a thread of alarm through me?“I am walking you to the Lion,” he told me. “Where I will turn you over to your mother. Let her deal with her impossible, wayward, disrespectful child.” And once more he had me by the hand and was leading me down the street.
As punishments went, that was rather disappointing. "

― , The Hero Strikes Back (Hero, #2)