Death is a better alternative than this village of biggots at least you die free.
The guys in this chapter seemed to be ready to rape the elf girl to make her theirs (not so fun fact in medieval Europe if you raped an unmarried woman your "punishment" was to be forced to marry her it may differs depending the place but that was the standard one, it was only until the Spanish Inquisition said this was not a punishment that they started treating it like an actual crime).
What does it have to do with this chapter ? i don't know it just gave me the "vibes" that made me think about this.
I think you are misrepresenting the punishment a bit here.
The women were the property of their spouses, and before that, of their father (or brother if the father had died). "Marriage" involved a large compensation paid to the prior owner ("dowry" iirc? though that might have been the word from cultures that on the contrary had the daughters family pay the spouse (to ensure they treat her well)), and overall treated much like a transference of goods (much like slaves (also much like slaves, the wife doesn't actually have much rights or protections against the spouse)).
So being "forced to marry the girl" effectively means
"forced to pay a large remuneration to the girls father as compensation", and then getting to 'take home the broken commodity'. It is like how many stores have a "if you break it, you buy it" policy.
I do agree that it [the crime and its punishment] is not very good either way. But there I actually have
larger issues with how the girl is treated as an object to begin with, and even the horribly lenient "punishment" or initial crime almost pales in comparison. She was
fated to be raped, even
if the father had married her to someone normally. Because I sure as hell don't consider the bridal night [of such a
transaction] (or any subsequent for that matter) as consensual.