Elspeth next spent some time teaching James the few phrases he would be capable of saying. The wording was her choice and he wasn't always happy with it, but there was no room for going off script. He had the choice of either repeating one of the phrases the witch had chosen for him verbatim, squawking or remaining silent.
For now there were a handful more phrases he was given on top of the all important "Yes Mistress" and "No Mistress".
"James wants a cracker Mistress" was the only way he could let the witch know he was hungry or similarly there was "James needs water Mistress" for when he was thirsty and the supply attached to his cage had run out.
"James's cage needs cleaning Mistress" was a humiliating but sometimes necessary request.
"My name is James. I'm Mistress Elspeth's pet parrot" was how he would now be able to introduce himself to guests with "Pleased to meet you human" added as a further humiliating salutation.
The only other words he had been given for now were the lyrics to some silly witches' song Elspeth occasionally made him perform for her amusement.
As the next day or two passed all James could do was sit on his perch and hope Elspeth got bored of keeping him like this. His experience would probably have been less bad if he had been given the mind of a bird, but sitting in his cage watching the old witch get on with her day while retaining his human consciousness soon became tedious.
Occasionally Elspeth would come and chat to James, though obviously his contribution to the conversation was obviously extremely limited. A couple of times a day he was allowed out of his cage as a prisoner might be. It was a fun feeling flying around the room for a few minutes before being ordered back into his home. He considered whether it would be possible to make it out of the window and fly to freedom, but if he did he would be stuck as a colourful bird for good. Or more likely Elspeth would find some way of magicing him back and he would be turned into an even lowlier creature as punishment.
Had James been an actual pet rather than a transformed human being kept as one against his will, he could have actually considered himself to be treated pretty well. In fact he was starting to worry about how attached Elspeth seemed to be getting to him in his current form. He really hoped she wasn't seriously planning on keeping him like this permanently. She hadn't mentioned anything about turning him back yet and he didn't have the ability to ask.
All he could do was wait and hope that this living nightmare ended soon.