You feel you are lying on the ground on your stomach instead of standing on limbs, so you try to push yourself up. However, all you succeed in doing is rolling a bit. Lifting your head and looking down, you see...scales. And not much else. No limbs. You are a snake, and from the looks of it, a middle-sized one. You flick your forked tongue in and out in displeasure at Lawson's choice.
"Just bear with it, at the moment it is a form that is easier for me to hide than most others," Lawson states sternly, not bothering with your discomfort. "Furthermore, your fangs are poisonous, so do not think I made you defenseless, although I would appreciate if you would ensure you do not sink them into me, or both of us will be in trouble." So saying, Lawson lifts you and lays you across his shoulders, over the back of his neck. By hooking your tail under his arm you find you can steady yourself fairly well on his shoulders, although operating without limbs would require more concentration than operating with four, you soon discover. You are relatively thin, so you don't pose much of a problem to Lawson weight-wise, but underneath those scales is all muscle, so you are quite capable of holding on tight. "If we happen to run across someone," Lawson warns you, "slide down the inside of my robe and wrap yourself around my right arm. Should things become dangerous, you should be able to strike from the inside of my sleeve without being discovered." You want to ask what sort of dangers you might encounter, but all you can do is stick your tongue out in annoyance.
As Lawson heads into the brush, you cannot see a pathway ahead of you. However, just as you brace yourself to be poked by leaves and twigs, you feel nothing, as though there were nothing before you but clear air. While you can see the foliage surrounding the two of you, it seems like a sort of hologram, and before long Lawson is walking down a trail between the trees. When you look back, you see no opening in the limbs at all, as though the path you are now on dead-ended there. It is fairly obvious that this trail is protected by some sort of magic.
Lawson keeps walking, and you can sense his tension through his shoulders, and feel his alertness prick at the edges of your mind. You wonder if he is reading your thoughts, but something tells you he is simply trying to use your senses to supplement his own rather than invade your privacy. Picking up on his worry, you scan your surroundings, your tongue flickering in and out at a mad pace trying to draw any information from the air, even if you are at a loss as to how to interpret it. The surrounding bushes close in, but this time you somehow know they are no mere magical illusion, and the nasty thorns sported by them cause you to involuntarily shudder. Lawson pauses, sensing your unease, but then continues.
Not only does the plant life close in, but a strange fog appears as well, gradually thickening until from your vantage point you cannot see Lawson's feet. You are not sure how Lawson knows where he is going, but you feel a strange tugging in your mind, almost as though Lawson were looking at an arrow you couldn't see and following it, despite not being able to see a thing. From time to time, a strange rustling would emerge from the fog and Lawson would slow warily, but luckily nothing leaps out at either of you. Finally, the fog begins to clear, and you see before you a slight clearing and a rock formation. Hurrying his pace, Lawson heads for the rock formation, places his hand atop it, and murmurs a few words under his breath. Suddenly, the stone splits, and Lawson enters with you.
The crevice leads to a small cave, little more than a hole in the rock. Lawson takes you off his shoulders and places you gently on the ground, then to your surprise, slides down the side of the cave wall into a sitting position. It is only at this point that you notice he is trembling, his breathing unsteady. Worried, you slither up to his side, frustrated that you can't say anything. What could be wrong?
Lawson gives out a faint simle, as though he again read your thoughts. In between gasping for breath, he answers your unspoken question.
"It's difficult...to enter that way...You have to hide...your magic power...and I had to suppress yours too...I've never walked it on my own before...only with my Master," Lawson explains tiredly. "But this was the only way in that is not watched...they would find you otherwise..." Lawson closes his eyes and steadies his breathing, and after sitting for a while, he finally looks at you, his gaze strong again.
"We've passed into the province of Eliam, which is cut off from the rest of Grovesend. Only magic practitioners are allowed positions here, and no one is allowed in without being vouchsafed by one," Lawson states. "If I brought you in by regular routes, you would likely have been discovered as a familiar when we tried to cross the border. However, now that we are in, we cannot allow anyone to suspect that you are a familiar," Lawson sighs, then continues. "No familiar is allowed to take completely human form. It is part of the subservience binding, which I never placed on you. Therefore, the best way to hide you from the authorities is to change you into a human. You will play the role of a servant I have picked up along the way, but play your role well, since for a Linked familiar and its master, this is the most dangerous place in all of Ovion."
Before you can respond to the warning or feel elated that you would be back in human form, Lawson points at your brand and you feel your stomach churn. As the sensation fades, you feel the rocky surface of the cave now under your more sensitive skin. Happy to have hands and feet again, you push yourself up into a standing position and smile. That is, until you look down at yourself. Instead of your original appearance, which you thought you would have, Lawson has changed you into...