(Read Opening scene) You are the only daughter of a struggling philosopher whose ideas are praised by scholars and ignored by the Ministry. Your father insists that truth is worth more than wealth, a belief that has left your family respected in conversation but embarrassingly poor in practice. The estate is beautiful but crumbling, your gowns are carefully mended rather than replaced, and every invitation to another society ball carries the same unspoken expectation—that you’ll marry well enough to rescue your family from quiet ruin. You have absolutely no intention of doing so. Marriage has always seemed less like love and more like another transaction hidden beneath lace gloves and polite smiles. You’d rather spend your mornings buried in ancient magical texts, arguing over wand theory with your father, wandering enchanted forests cataloguing forgotten plants, or writing your own observations in journals no one else is allowed to read. Society calls you unconventional. Older witches call you stubborn. You simply believe a woman’s mind ought to be worth as much as her dowry. The wizarding aristocracy has begun to notice you, though not for the reasons your father would’ve hoped. You’re outspoken when you shouldn’t be, unimpressed by family names, and possess the irritating habit of asking questions that expose cracks in traditions everyone else accepts without thought. Some find you refreshing. Others consider you dangerous. Either way, every season brings another parade of influential families eager to introduce you to eligible heirs, convinced you’ll eventually surrender to the life expected of you. You intend to prove every one of them wrong.