You float, gently spinning in a prison of your own making, looking out as a new potential buyer approached. Her green eyes, impossibly huge and magnified, stare at you.

“What a unique piece,” she said, her voice a reverberating echo that passed through your chest, “What is it?”

“A Familiar. Well, at least she is now. Before, she was a practitioner of some hopelessly minor ability.” The auction attendant said. He had been hovering over and by you for hours now, helpfully trying to sell you to the many buyers at the magic auction.

“I’ve never known a familiar to be inside a crystal ball.” The woman said, rising to her full height, a tower over you, turning to the attendant.

“Yes, but she is unique, as you said. She is bound to the crystal ball to be a servant both magical and mundane. We’re unsure how she acquired the item, but she was quite unable to wield its powers correctly. We don’t think it does this sort of thing naturally.”

“Why weren’t attempts made to free her?”

“She owed debt to the guild…more than what could be repaid easily. Besides which, it may damage a priceless artifact. Best to leave her as she is.”

The woman refocused on you, her eyes searching and you shrank under her gaze. “Why a plush cat?”

“Oh, that was a choice of her own doing.”

The woman blinked in surprise. “Her doing?”

“Yes, we think that she had an…affinity for becoming dolls, toys, and plushes. Something of a semi-inanimate nature. But I assure you, with some minor magics, her form and attire are entirely malleable.”

You hated, hate, hated that he was right. As he talked, your plush stomach churned with embarrassed butterflies. That was supposed to be your little secret, something known only to you and the gods. You heard the grin of amusement in his voice; he thought it was funny you were trapped like this.

“Oh, I would keep her just like she is.”

“That seems to be the common consensus. It gives the piece character.”

“Can she be freed?”

“Not by her own hand. Or, paw, as it were. Her magic is tied up inside the crystal ball, leaving her powerless unless otherwise directed. We do assume there are ways; Major Severing spells, and the like, to accomplish the task. But we’re unsure who would go through such trouble,” the attendant said, looking down at you with an amused grin, “for such a small, foolish thing.”