Our Silent Vows

Chapter Three

Past

Savanna's POV - 10 years old

It had been a month since I arrived in San Marchesi, and despite the time that passed, I still felt like an outsider. The days had blurred into each other, heavy with the weight of unfamiliarity. I missed home—Seattle, my old life, the warmth of familiarity. Here, everything was different. The air was thick with the summer heat, the town bathed in sunlight that felt too bright, too foreign for someone still wrapped in the gloom of loss.

Dario was rarely home. He was always busy, always off somewhere I wasn't allowed to know about. When he was home, it was usually late at night, and the only time we spent together was at dinner. We didn't talk much. He ate in silence, and I mirrored his actions, unsure of what to say. It wasn't the warm family dinners I remembered having with mom. These meals were cold, quiet, as if there was an invisible wall between us that neither of us dared to cross.

The house was big, but it felt empty. Most days, When I wasn't reading, I wandered through the hallways on my own, exploring rooms I didn't recognize and sitting by windows that overlooked a town I was still unfamiliar with. It wasn't like back home where I had friends everywhere and a best friend. There was no one here, no one my age, no one to talk to. The language was strange, the people distant, and it left me feeling even more isolated.

The only company I had was Maria, and even she was often busy with her work. When she had a moment to spare, she would sit with me, sometimes attempting to teach me Italian or simply chatting with me in her gentle, broken English. But Maria wasn't a replacement for the life I'd left behind. She was kind, but I could tell she didn't fully understand the weight of my loneliness.

Every few days, they took me out shopping. They dressed me up as if I were a doll to be put on display, and I wondered why it mattered so much when there was no one here to see me. But I never questioned it out loud. I went along with it, because it was better than sitting in that too-big house alone.

Then, one afternoon, my father approached me. "You need to be on your best behavior tonight," he said, his voice firm but distant. He explained that we were going to have dinner with someone important, a man he worked with. He didn't say much more than that. There was no warmth in his voice, no hint of excitement or reassurance. Just a command.

Maria spent what felt like hours preparing me for the evening, far longer than any other time she had helped me get ready. The pale blue dress she chose felt stiff and foreign against my skin, its lace collar brushing uncomfortably against my neck. My hair was pulled tightly into a neat bun. The shoes, shiny and new, pinched painfully at my feet. Gone were the comfortable sneakers I had worn every day, the ones I could run in without a second thought. My shorts, my simple t-shirts, my favorite overalls—all replaced by this delicate dress that made me feel like a stranger in my own skin.

When it was time to leave, my father didn't say much—he rarely did. He simply led me to the car with a curt nod, his usual silent command. The drive was so short that I wondered why we even bothered taking the car. It felt unnecessary. We could've easily walked, but instead, we sat in silence as the car wound its way through the narrow streets of San Marchesi.

Then, the mansion came into view.

My breath caught in my throat. I had never seen anything like it in my life. The mansion was colossal, far bigger than anything I could have imagined. Its stone walls stretched up toward the sky, towering over everything, and the massive iron gates creaked open as we approached, as if welcoming us into a different world.

The gardens that surrounded the mansion were unlike anything I had ever seen. The grass was perfectly trimmed, every flower in full bloom, arranged in precise patterns that looked almost too perfect to be real. Statues of marble, so lifelike they seemed to be watching us, lined the path we took toward the entrance. I had never seen so much space dedicated to just... beauty. This place felt like a castle, like something out of a dream or these Barbie movies I used to watch.