Mercy squeezes back on the paw holding her hand. There is that ever-present uncanny strangeness when Rue is in their human guise and she's feeling something entirely different... but Mercy tries to set that aside. Or maybe the instinctive unease will give Rue a tiny burst of fear to feed on. That... wouldn't be for a bad cause. No. She certainly owes the owlbear that much and more.

"We get our own types of mischief and drama. You seen Mr. Martin shoving the bug sweets into the plants?" There's a fond smile on her lips, rather than reproach. "I know he's got a powerful fear of anything crawling or squirming, but I got to tease him something terrible, pretending I didn't understand what he was doing. Tried convincing me he was giving the plant sugar."