Doug's Undead Familiar - the Lurch

A series of dark enchantments must first be made on the iron spike as it binds the undead to you.

You gain the service of a familiar, an undead spirit is channeled into the corpse you choose, either an oversized  zombie, or an oversized  skeleton, either receives and additional [roll]2d8[/roll] hp. The iron control spike is inserted through the back of the skull, binding it to you as a familiar or Lurch.

Your Lurch acts independently of you, but it always obeys your commands. In combat, it acts on your initiative. A Lurch can attack and it can take other actions as normal.

When the Lurch drops to 0 hit points, it becomes dust.  A new corpse must be found but the iron spike is left ready to be used again.

While your Lurch is within 100 feet of you, you can communicate with it telepathically. Additionally, as an action, you can see through your Lurch's eyes and hear what it hears until the start of your next turn. During this time, you are deaf and blind with regard to your own senses.

You can't have more than one Lurch at a time nor can you have a Lurch while having a familiar.

Finally, when you cast a spell with a range of touch, your Lurch can deliver the spell as if it had cast the spell. Your Lurch must be within 100 feet of you, and it must use its reaction to deliver the spell when you cast it. If the spell requires an attack roll, you use your attack modifier for the roll.

Doug believes that this spell may scale to higher levels but he has yet to uncover these secrets.