EMBER’S POV

I didn’t know what a mating ceremony meant, not really.

I didn’t understand the severity of the bond I was about to forge, the permanence of the choice being made for me.

I just knew that my mother told me to smile and my father told me to be grateful and Harrison told me I was going to make his son very happy.

No one asked what would make me happy.

No one cared.

They took a girl who barely understood herself, who was still figuring out who she was and who she wanted to become, and they erased everything about her.

Stripped away her dreams, her voice,...