Familiar Binding

Controversy and Legal Restrictions

In many circles, the use of the spell is often considered in the same vein as most other mind control spells and classified as abuse and torture to the animal. When botched, the spell can also pose a major risk to the caster themselves, the animal involved, and anyone around when it is broken or interrupted and the animal no longer able to be controlled. Due to the spell's incredibly limited applications, it is rarely used outside of specific scenarios and without good reason, with its use having hefty fines attached to it.

Legal Usage

It is maintained in most countries that one cannot use familiars without strong evidence to a benefit to the caster, training in animal handling and care, and most often certification for the desired usage. Most regions also highly regulate what animals legally can be used for the spell, in most areas being limited to small harmless animals or domestics, though this can vary as organizations such as the Laramidia National Park Organization and some zoos will occasionally use it in trapping and relocating large and dangerous wildlife or during medical procedures to keep an animal calm.
One widely recognized use of the familiar binding spell is in the use of service animals, mainly being medical alert animals to better alert their casters of upcoming medical issues and prepare them in case of emergency. As the spell allows the caster and animal to be much more in tune and communicate, it has seen much use for epilepsy and allergy cases where in the caster may be immobilized or in medical duress and require outside assistance to get proper medical care. Dogs are by far the most widely used animal for this purpose, although many areas have expanded to allowing some birds, cats, and small mammals.
Search and Rescue operations also make use of the spell quite frequently, allowing medical and first responders to better communicate with the animals on finding disaster victims and guiding their familiars in preventing further damage when rescues are made. It has been widely used in earthquake and flood prone areas to remove victims that may be suffering broken bones in the neck and spine without causing permanent paralysis and to allow rescue workers to more quickly locate victims.
Many areas also allow temporary use of the spell with hunting and sport companions, generally being hunting dogs and falconry birds. In these cases the spell is always temporary and only used on the companion animal, not prey, in order to ensure the animal is not lost and does not become feral or abandoned while prioritizing the creature's safety. Most competitions involving animals regulate it cannot be used to increase the animal's performance and can only be used for recall.

Effect

A familiar binding spell will have the effect of binding an animal to the caster, allowing the caster to share their will, intentions, and to some degrees, their own control over the creature. Casters bound to familiars can also share sensations with them and the animal to their caster, such as pain, emotions, thoughts, and to some degree, what they can see around them.

Side/Secondary Effects

As binding a familiar is not a curse, it must be maintained at all times by the caster, creating a huge draw on their aura reserves. At any time where the spell is broken, be it intentionally or due to a lack of aura to fuel it, the animal initially bound will return to its natural state of mind shortly after a period of distress and confusion. The spell's required amount of aura to keep being cast increases dramatically with the size and intelligence of the animal it is being used on. In most cases, any time the spell is used on an animal larger than that of a large dog, it is temporary, almost always used in circumstances to calm an animal and remove it from the area before it can cause much damage.
In addition to the high magic draw of the spell, the caster and creature sharing sensations and emotions can easily become an issue- if the animal panics or tries to engage in natural behaviors, it can cause the caster to do so as well or become emotionally or physically distressed or act inappropriately. In many cases, casters may begin to ignore sensations from their familiars due to so many of them not being critical, eventually ignoring major warning signs that something is wrong. Many casters of the spell also become prone to massively over or under eating due to the sensations from their familiars, mistakenly eating or not eating for themselves due to the animal's appetite. The opposite can also occur, where familiars will refuse food or binge eat in accordance to their caster's appetite, and may become morbidly obese or underweight.
When broken, as the animals are often distressed and beginning to return to natural behaviors, the situation can become dangerous quite quickly when large animals and carnivores are involved. As its quite easy for animals under the spell to be in poor health, habituated to people, or starving if under the spell for long periods, there have been many cases of casters who have used it on dangerous wildlife being mauled and killed by their former familiars. As such, most casters prefer using small animals that are easy to control, such as mice, rats, cats, dogs, small birds, or harmless reptiles and amphibians.

Manifestation

Animals bound by the caster are under their control and can be manipulated as the caster sees fit. Oftentimes familiars will also share auras with their casters if close enough, and auras around the animal will generally show the same fluctuations in mood and behavior as their caster.

Related School

Mind Control

Effect Duration

Until no longer maintained

Effect Casting Time

Constant

Range

Short range