The bowl is yielded, freeing his hands to reach down to Thot.

Whose pinned ears have not gone unnoticed.

But still, Ellis makes a low, coaxing noise for her as he lifts Thot's feathery little body off the cavern floor. If she is tense, it is only an echo of what Ellis feels. Often, he has the sense that every bit of information he passes to Silas will be something he comes to regret sooner or later.

There's no other way around it, at this point. It's no real comfort, but it's true.

"Do you want to talk of something else?"

They've the rest of the way back to turn this topic over and over between them. If Silas wants a respite, there's no reason to avoid it.