Most players (especially tamers) rely on pets to some extent or other. Warriors require Horses to ride on, while Pack Horses and Giant Beetles are of great use to resource collectors and crafters.
When your pet dies, instead of taming or buying a new one, a players can bond with their pet. This allows the player to restore a dead pet to life.
In order to bond a pet, right-click the animal and select "Start Bonding". It takes a total of 10 days to bond a creature. This can be reduced by 'petting' your pet once every 24 hours, down to a minimum of 5 days. A typical approach to bonding a first mount, for example, is to leave it in the stables during this bonding period, as non-bonded pets cannot be resurrected if they die.
Once bonded, a creature will display the title "(bonded)" under its name instead of "(tame)".
Pets that do not eat (such as Skittering Hoppers, Golems and summoned creatures) cannot be bonded.
A bonded pet, when killed, turns into a ghost that will accept non-combat based commands. It cannot target or be targeted while in this form, nor can it be stabled. A player with Veterinary skill is capable of resurrecting the creature. However, as a result the pet will lose 0.1 from any skills it had prior to death.
These skills can be trained back to 100 or whatever they were when the pet was first tamed (whichever value is higher). Pet deaths do not affect their stats or resistances.
Only a player with enough Veterinary skill may resurrect bonded creatures. The Resurrection spell and Wandering Healers cannot be used.