Flashback ( PDFDrive )

allowed to marry. Nope.
Fitz looked away. Sounds like you’re leaning toward not registering. . . .
I’m not leaning toward anything, she promised. I seriously have no idea
what to do.
She couldn’t deny that a small part of her desperately wanted to
find out who would end up on her match lists—the same part that had
a feeling the Winnowing Galas would be . . . kind of amazing. She was
sure they’d be awkward and embarrassing, too, but . . . it’d be like
going to prom—only a million times prettier and cooler and fancier
because that’s how the elves rolled.
But at the same time, the whole matchmaking process sounded
so . . . unnatural.
She understood why the elves had created the system, given that
their indefinite life span and ageless appearance made the chance of
distant relatives accidentally ending up together a really gross
possibility. And they were also trying to match people on a genetic
level, so that their kids would have the best shot at manifesting
powerful abilities, and so the elvin gene pool would be as strong and
diverse as possible.
But none of that was very romantic, and she really didn’t like the
idea of having that part of her life controlled. And sometimes the
process was super unfair. Dex and his siblings had been looked down
on their whole lives because their dad was Talentless, and that made
him a bad match. And Brant had joined the Neverseen because he and
Jolie were a bad match too, since pyrokinesis was forbidden.
You’re overthinking it, Fitz told her, and her heart jumped into her
throat as she realized he’d probably overheard that entire mental
monologue. But I get it—it’s a big decision.