SOLVED. Fantasy magic female lead magic user/tiered magic system. [s]

[Theo1290]

Looking for a book I read some years (I'd wager between 2014-2017 though I'm confident it's older) ago, was a fantasy fiction with a female lead (intelligent, independent) who used magic and two male companions. (sword user and thief?) Is possibly an Australian series.

All the plot details I could remember: protagonist is part of a rich family?- her house burned down by assassins at the start of the story. Central antagonist is some emperor or dictator or something, quite a few governments/monarchies in the world IIRC. One of the characters is the honourable swordsman archetype, the other is of short figure and quite involved with debauchery. In one of the books they are sent to different dimensions, one of which is heavily implied to be Earth-with the characters seeing cars as being some sort of dragons, being mistaken as Dr Who cosplayers by a bartender and escaping arrest?- cops shot at them- female lead stops time and is surprised that the cops expected such small objects (bullets) to do any damage to them. Female lead is romantically involved with swordsman at some point. Actual dragons were quite significant plot-wise IIRC. Swordsman has a brief moment with magic where he is given enough to take out an army- and is left quite emotionally fatigued.

Magic could be quite powerful in the world and magic users were ranked by tier/level, the higher the tier/level the more powerful. i.e. tier 1= very weak, tier 14= King's personal bodyguard.

Edit: I'm unsure of this, but I think the 3 main character names started with a z, d and j.

[SBC]

Is it Dragonlinks by Paul Collins? It's an Australian series and the characters are Zimak, Daretor, and Jelindel,

[Theo1290]

Yes! I knew I was onto something with the letters. Thanks mate.

[SBC]

All good, glad I could help.