After that day, Domenico truly lost his mind. He spent all his time outside the estate gates like a beggar, wearing tattered clothes and huddled in the corner. He watched me come and go with the children.
Sometimes the children would glance at him curiously and point, asking, "Mommy, who's that man?"
He would force out a smile uglier than crying. He would hold broken toys he had scavenged from somewhere and try to hand them over, mumbling, "Sweeties... Daddy..."

However, I never let the children accept anything from him. I never let them get close to him. And I never spoke another word to him.
Salvatore once asked me if this was too cruel.
I looked out the window at the figure huddled in the rain, feeling nothing. "Father, when he tried to sell me for one dollar at that auction, when he abandoned me in an exploding car for her, when he killed our children with his own hands… Did he ever consider whether that was cruel?"
Salvatore sighed and said nothing more.
Domenico died on a cold winter night. They said he had been trying to retrieve the engraved plate that read, 'Until death do us part', after the wind blew it away.
He accidentally fell into the freezing river. With his bad leg and years of heavy drinking, his body had long since failed him. He could not climb back up.

When they found him, his body was frozen solid. He still clutched that plate in his hand. His fingers had dug so hard into the metal that they were almost embedded in the grooves, bloody and mangled.
The names engraved on it had been worn away by his constant rubbing until they were barely legible.
When I heard the news, I was reading the children a bedtime story. My hand paused on the page for just a moment, then I resumed as if nothing had happened.
"Mommy, what happened to the evil king after that?" my son asked, blinking his big eyes curiously.

I closed the book, kissed his forehead, and then my daughter's cheek. I said gently, "Later, the evil king was punished and disappeared forever."
"What about the princess?" my daughter hugged my arm and asked softly.
"The princess..." I looked out at the falling snow and smiled with genuine peace. "The princess became a queen and lived happily ever after with her little prince and princess."
Domenico's funeral was simple. Apart from Salvatore and me, no one came to see him off.
I stood before the headstone, looking at the young, handsome face in the black and white photograph.
It was Domenico from ten years ago, the one who proposed to me in the church. He had been in love with me then, swearing to protect me for the rest of his life.
He was finally, truly dead.
I removed the brand-new diamond ring from my ring finger. Salvatore had given it to me the day I took control of the family. It symbolized power and freedom.
As for the ring Domenico gave me, it was lost long ago.
"If there's a next life, I hope we won't cross paths again," I said softly, my tone calm without hatred or love.
Then, I turned, took my two children by the hand, and walked out of the cemetery without looking back.
Sunlight broke through the clouds and fell on the snow, reflecting a brilliant glow.
The wind in Cecilo was still biting, but I would never feel cold again—because I knew my future was bright.