-snip-
This I like.
Agreed.
It could backfire once they discover our True Nature, but it's a good plan for now. I'm reminded of a GURPS campaign in which the players were dragon riders. One of the players had a cat-sized (his words) dragon named Zippy (well, the PC's name for it was), who I gave the personality of a cat. The dragon avoided the PC, got him to accidentally cast a sleep spell on himself, poo'd in his boot, vanished until he showed up at the enemy castle, and basically defected for a steak.
Let's be kinda like Zippy.
And for when our identity as the mage's familiar is discovered, claim we're a dragon hatchling who he corrupted by magic and who just *sob* wants to find his parents...And if the whole party's so heartless as to still want to kill us, we cut our losses and run. But there's always
one person who cares.