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This is the story of Tamsen Ka'antira de Asphodel. Tamsen grows up under the protection of Kaldarte the Seer, the mystic younger sister of Antir, and Ar’ami Ka’antira, a second cousin and husband to the Seer, who is a powerful Woodlands Lord. The couple calls upon Hyagrem, a human battlemage and their friend, to help train the girl in the usage of her powers. Due to her mixed heritage, she not only possesses the Elven elemental magic, but the human ability to use all of the elements. This enables her to control things magically (i.e. the weather) that no other mage can, whether Elf or human. The only other members of this generation of Ka’antira are her cousins, Liliath and Cetenne, who are the twin granddaughters of Kaldarte. The Elves bring the twins to learn alongside Tamsen, and the Seer starts to insinuate Elven magic, traditions, and customs into her foster-daughter. When Tamsen reaches the age of eighteen, the priests of Leselle inform the Elders of the Council that the hereditary heir to the Elven throne is female, half-Elven, and prepared to come of age. The Ka’antira family journeys to Leselle, where Tamsen is informed of her heritage and undergoes the ritual testing (test of resolve) in her coming-of-age ceremony before the Council. She emerges as a legal adult, princess of the Ka’antira, and the (contested) heir to the throne. And there, the story begins. Asphodel is a densely populated magical world, with strong roots in Greco-Roman and Summerian mythology. It is a story I began to write at the age of 16, pounding it out on my old electric typewriter, one that has lingered in the back of my mind for twenty years. This final incarnation of Asphodel bears little resemblence to the story I originally wrote, save for a few characters and the makeup of the lands. I strove to create a world with diverse and complicated politics, where the old ways of chivalry are being forced out and the numerous races do not interact. I've taken the traditional fantasy race of the Elves and modernized them, giving them more than the nature-bound whimsy of their stereotypical role. I've put them in an uneasy truce with the humans of Ansienne, one in which both races ignore the existence of the other. And then I gave them a bridge: Tamsen de Asphodel. A child of seemingly human parents with a strain of Elven royal blood, she is a link created by the gods to rectify the mistakes both races committed in the past. Tamsen breaks the barriers of Elven tradition and human prejudice, rising to a level of magical and political power neither nation expected. She, in turn, has strong external ties to the two people. Brial Ka'briona is an Elven scout with a hatred of humans and sorcerers alike. Anner de Ceollliune is a human noble, a warrior with a chivalric desire to protect. The Reckoning of Asphodel brings them all to the threshold of their fates.