As she slowly opened her eyes, she could see that it was still dark out a deep purple with a few sparkling little dots of light. There was no other light source in her room at the top of the tower, but she didn’t need them, her light eyes, the colour of blue diamonds had had that much magical energies poured through them that they could see in any condition – she could even see the flow of magic throughout the world, or in some cases like here the lack of magic. She approached the window in a short white silk nightgown and looked over the city of Velendale. She could see the city walls glowing in the distance, the walls that stopped magic being used within .. mostly at least.

She had only slept for a couple of hours – but that was all she really needed. With an errant thought about a dozen candles through the room all ignited. It was time to get ready for the day ahead. Her nightgown shimmered and disappeared as she turned towards the vanity table at the other side of the room at the top of her tower. As she walked over to it a light golden glow shimmered around her and her clothes appeared – seeming to just shimmer into existence. As she sat at the small seat in front of the window she looked at her reflection. She wasn’t a vain person but being a guild leader meant she needed to look flawless at all times lest it reflect poorly on the guild as a whole she willed a little colour (Pink today) to her lips and cheeks. Her hair its normal shoulder long wavy black was still in perfect position. As she looked into the little jewellery box on the table in front of her. She picked a loose mithril chain with a blue gemstone the size of her thumbnail and set it as a circlet around her head, she picked matching tear drop earrings with matching blue sapphires and a choker necklace to match. As she studied herself in the mirror she noticed a light wrinkle at the corner of an eye. She sighed – it was time again.

She was giving a guest lecture to the fourth year students of Auroras – but that was mid-morning. She focused on the air in front of her and a ripple in the air began to twist and turn around itself a portal opened on to a small grassy field, the sunlight was shining on the gently flowing grass with the occasional wild flower here and there. She stepped through the portal on to the small glade the grass felt soft beneath her feet and the sweet smell of the flowers filled her lungs. The gate spell she used was an eighth tier spell that connected 2 locations the problem with it was she could only connect to a place she knew every inch of and as such she only had a few locations she could go to. This location a small glade up in the mountains to the east of the country the sun was shining here casting long shadows in the morning light. More importantly she could feel and see the abundant magical energies – looking like a massive swirling rainbow all around her, she tuned that out and set her vision to normal, the glade was small only a couple of dozen meters across before the mountains rose sharply to her left and right a little jagged outcrop behind her his the glade and in front there was a steady rise towards the mountains peak there was also a small clear stream of ice cold water that filled a rough stone bowl about three meters wide fed from the peaks above her before running along and back underground. This little sanctuary she found a few hundred years ago – just after she learnt flight magic, she had enchantments and barriers around this glade but they had never activated so as far as she was aware she was the only person ever to set food on this soft relaxing field. But more importantly this area was very rich in magical energies and this was why she came.

She opened herself up and began to pull magical energy from all around into her core, she was careful not to drain the life energy from the grass and flowers but as pulled, her core started to fill. She used this ambient magic and converted it to life energy, she started to grow younger, from what would have been very early thirties to high twenties, to mid then she finally stopped at what she classed would be twenty three. If she focused and pulled any more than that it would show clearly on her face that she was younger and converting ambient magic to life magic was somewhat complex and disastrous if done wrong. She had seen someone try this and pulled the life energy directly and totally into there core, that left them with the torso of a new born, with the arms legs and head of a much older man, he died in just a few second a deep breath that ruptured his lungs and the blood flow the rest of his body made his heart exploded, after that she vowed to never show anyone again and the thought of eternal youth and life really brought out the worst in people. Plus she could use her life energy to power her magical abilities in areas that had a dampening effect, like the city so she only knew of one other person with this knowledge and he too had vowed to never reveal the secret.

A loud screech nearby caught her attention, she cast a glance all around herself and it didn’t take her long to find the source above her coming in to land in the glade was a wyvern, about forty feet in length from nose to tail and a wing span of about thirty feet tip to tip. The wyvern unlike the dragon did not have front legs, its long sinuous body landed a few meters away. It was the colour of autumn leaves a mix between green and yellow. A pair of strong hind legs bunched as it landed, still holding its wings wide as it shrieked at the small woman in front of it. She could still see little lines of veins through its leathery bat like wings. It puffed out it chest as it looked down on her its triangular head giving it more of a beak than a snout and a ridge of little horns ran from just under its eyes to meet in the back and continued running down its back.

Most real dragon could speak and or use telepathy to communicate – she doubted this one could be she addressed it anyway saying with a small smile.

“Hello little one. What brings you here?”

The slits in the wyverns eye slightly widened as if trying to bring her into focus, before it angrily snapped at the air above her, then seeing its little nose crunch up as it sniffed the air. Zelda stood there head slightly tilted to the side with a small smile on her face as she looked up to the beast above her. She seen it taking a big inhale of air and sighed as it spewed out a torrent of blue flames at her. She created a transparent barrier of null void and shaped it to cup the flames and direct them up and away from her. Then using some of the ambient magic around her she focused and started to float up towards the wyvern, as its breath attack finished the wyvern stopped to see the damage – she could see the look of confusing in its eyes that not even the grass was singed. But by this time Zelda was eye to eye with the beast and she lightly reached out and while saying

“Bad, dragon!” she flicked its snout with the tip of her middle finger. The wyverns head flew back followed by the rest of its body it soared back a dozen meters and slammed into the side of the mountain before crumpling into an ungraceful, confused heap on the ground.

It flopped on to its front and using its wings pushed itself back to its feet, still swaying slightly with its eyes unfocused it shook its head as it regained its composure. Still hovering a few meters in the air with her head tilted still smiling was Zelda looking at the young dragon kin. The young wyvern gave one last defiant screech at her before beating its powerful wings and flying away. Sorcery lowered herself to the ground to enjoy the peace and tranquillity of this little glade and allowed herself to relax by soaking her feet in the cold water basin.

Then just as she was thinking of going back to the guild she felt it a pulse of magic a little south and quite far to the west. The magic was a dark twisted perversion of the same life magic she had just used – but instead of pulling in the ambient magic from the air – it is pulled out a person – Stealing their life energy to empower them self’s. She was tempted to go and find its source, but held back necromancy wasn’t illegal in the kingdom, despite her efforts, and some towns used that as a form of capital punishment. Putting it out of her mind she focused on the air in front of her and opened a portal back to the top of her tower.