Dion limped home, feeling incredibly tired after a long day of work. His leg ached particularly badly, and he knew he needed to rest it.
As he opened the door of his house he was greeted by a young bright voice, "Papa!" He caught the red haired sprite of a little girl and swept her up, some of his exhaustion leaving as his precious gift from Xi'eli giggled and hugged him.
Of course sometimes her red hair caused him distress - personally he didn't dislike it even though his wife did. But he worried for Zylvia's future. It was so uncommon, so jarring that she would probably have difficulties as others might avoid her. He might be worrying too much of course, but he wanted his little girl to have a wonderful life. With friends, a-a husband someday - though just the thought of her leaving was too much.
As he sat down he held his precious bundle in his arms as she happily started telling him about her day. He brushed the four year old girl's wild hair out of her face. Had it already been three years? He fell into a remembrance of that day - and something he'd never completely told his wife(all he'd told her was he had found Zylvia in the woods).
It had been before he had had to retire from being an active knight - before his leg injury. He'd been guarding the border next to Nix'Ryl. A fairly easy job, thanks to the boundary stones the Court Sorcerer had set up.
The night before however something odd had been happening on the other side - a lot of flashes of light, screams that were chilling to the bone and loud crashing noises. All had gone silent by morning and though the knights were on guard all day, nothing happened.
Night had fallen and Dion had been absentmindedly peering towards the wooded area on the other side of the border when he had seen something. A dark spiraling orb with trails of a dark smoky tail of sorts caught his attention. To this day, Dion did not know what came over him to follow it.
But he had, through a dark forest lit only by the stars. Past fallen trees and signs of a great struggle. There was a lot of blood, places where it was actual pools of blood. But the blood wasn't human. No, human blood didn't bubble like that. At one point Dion almost headed back - but for some reason he didn't. It was almost as if he was in a daze. All he knew was he had to follow the strange smoky wisp.
It led him to a clearing and Dion gulped as he felt a palpable feeling of magic charge in the air. A soft glow was what drew his eyes first to the little bundle under the tree. When he realized what he was looking at he stepped forward hastily reaching for it. What was a child doing in this place!?
The glow surrounding the child broke as he picked her up, and her brow furrowed a little but she did not wake up yet. Dion straightened and turned to look at the still bobbing wisp. It suddenly came over and hovered over the child.
"Who are you?" Dion asked softly, staring it down. He didn't exactly expect an answer, but he had a feeling it was intelligent - there was no way it leading him here was a coincidence.
To his surprise it backed off, and slowly grew to look vaguely humanoid. "Just a dead man who wants his final act not to have been in vain. Take care of her, please."
And with that it slowly vanished. Dion stood there, holding the baby to his chest as he wondered exactly what had happened. He knew he would likely not tell anyone - especially not his wife. She might live in Carendlus but she was a bit overly suspicious towards magic and the supernatural. She'd never let him keep the child if he told her this.
He took the child back with him, and examined her. She was approximately a year old. Her hair was little ringlets of red. She was wrapped in a soft quilted blanket that had a name embroidered on it. Zylvia. That must be her name - he liked it.
All he told his wife was that he had found the child in the woods. As they had no children she happily let him keep the child that he had found.
Coming out of his reverie, Dion patted his little girl's head. He adored his little Zylvia and hoped that she would always know that to him it didn't matter that his blood didn't flow through her veins. She would always be his little girl.