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What their culture needs is a system similar to ancient Greeks where a girl can be promised away to another man in marriage at any age. So, if you have a baby girl and you know you want your friend's son who is 12yo to marry the girl when he's 24yo and she's 12, you can promise her to him right away or wait a few years until he's like 17yo and she's 5yo so he's an adult and can make his own decisions. He can choose to accept the 5yo as promised to him. This gives him special privileges/rights over the girl in the sense that any man who violates her would be considered as transgressing on his property despite the fact they aren't officially married. Then when she reaches the correct age for marriage, usually 12-16yo, they are officially married. What this promise in marriage does is essentially secure a marriage before the girl is truly old enough to marry. She still grows as a normal girl without a husband but she's off limits basically to other men and her husband to me would have some say in her development though he wouldn't be her caretaker yet.

It's a great concept tbh and I think many cultures would be better off with such a process. 9yo is just too young for true marriage but I understand the need to promise women of any age to other men.