Dorie
“I thought this was what you wanted, Princess. Why are you looking so glum?”
Not only did she carry her phone and something she called “a tablet” with her everywhere she went. But she also took the Lord’s name in vain, talked back to her husband, and ordered everyone around—female and male. Not to mention what she referred to as "telling it like it is."
Behind her in the mirror’s reflection, Aunt Tara frowned and thumped her on the shoulder. “Seriously, tell me what’s up! Why haven’t you been going around bragging all week like Hamish about your mom choosing Alban to mate?”
The older sister became the new helpmate.
Aunt Tara thought Dorie would be getting the family she’d wanted when she returned to Alban’s house. But Dorie knew what would happen if her mother had a boy. She’d have to drop out of the kingdom school and spend her days doing all the household chores while Maem took care of her baby brother.
But Dorie wouldn’t bother Tara with her huge incoming problem. Or Hamish.
It was bad to complain. And Dorie knew she should want to leave school so that she could help out at home. That was her sacred duty. Just thinking these thoughts made her a terrible daughter.
Maybe Joshua had been right. Maybe there really was some kind of evil in her. Maybe that was why instead of simply saying yes to all her prayers, God had turned her into a first-born helpmate.
Maybe this was her punishment for killing Joshua.
All those possibilities sat like stones in Dorie’s stomach as she lied to Tara. “I’m fine.”
Aunt Tara didn’t look like she believed her. But a pounding knock sounded on the bathroom door before she could ask any more questions.
“Are ye ready to go yet or not?” Hamish demanded on the other side of the door.
He sounded the same way he had ever since bringing her to live in the castle a week ago. Grumpy.
He was the one who’d said they had to let Maem and Alban have the house. He'd explained to her that it was Faoiltiarn tradition to leave a new couple alone for seven days for their bairnmoon.
But Hamish had been angry about having to move with her to the castle. Dorie knew because he’d stopped talking on their daily hikes. And when he'd come down to eat dinner with Aunt Tara, Uncle Magnus, and her, he only opened his mouth to boss Dorie around.
He’d say things like, “Pass me the bread already, Dorie,” as if she could read his mind and should have already done it.
And if she'd paused for even a few seconds to locate what he wanted on the table, he’d grouse, “Hurry up then, lass,”
Recalling all those dinners, Dorie scrambled out of her seat and rushed to the door to answer his knock.
“What took you so long?” he snapped anyway.
Dorie’s heart sank. Her blood grandpa had rarely acknowledged her back in Saint Albert. He’d even taken to pretending as if he didn’t see her after she turned out to be toothless. So, she’d been so happy when Hamish asked her to call him Senair.
And he’d been a better grandfather than she could have hoped for.
“Good morning to you, wee Dorie!” he'd used to say when she came down to breakfast at Alban’s house as if she'd lit up his whole morning. “How are you doing this fine day?”
He'd shown her all around the village and taken her up and down the surrounding mountains. He'd let her pull all the eggs for breakfast, and every day after class, he'd been waiting outside the schoolhouse to walk her home.
Her new grandfather had always listened to her stories without interrupting. And he'd conspired with her over ways to get Alban and Maem to realize they ought to get married. He'd even promised to gift her with one of the royal horses if they managed to pull it off.
But school had been cancelled for the last few days.
Hamish had muttered something about Mrs. Glaswolf having "some personal problems, not easily solved" when Dorie had asked him about it.
And there'd been no talk of horses since they'd arrived for their castle stay.
Hamish hadn't even wanted to go with her to the stables when she'd visited with Queen Elizabeth.
It was as if Dorie’s already beloved grandfather had been completely replaced by some stranger she'd never met. Until the terrible week after her mother went into heat.
“Sorry,” she mumbled to Hamish in the doorway. She had to work hard to keep the misery out of her voice.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to walk over with you, Princess?” Aunt Tara asked, coming up to stand behind Dorie. She placed a hand on her niece’s shoulder, and Dorie felt slovenly grateful that one person still seemed to like her.
But Hamish snapped out an answer before Dorie could even open her mouth. “Nae time for visitors! Duchess Dorie needs to return to her home. And I’ve already got my work cut out for me after a week of being away from my darlings.”
“Your darlings?” Tara asked, scrunching her forehead.
“That’s what he calls his chickens,” Dorie explained. Before blankly saying, “Goodbye, Aunt Tara. Thank you for hosting me.”
Hamish didn’t utter one word to Dorie on the walk back to the house, and her stomach became tighter and tighter with dread.
By the time they reached the front door, she felt a weird urge to cry with grief. Something had died since the last time she stepped foot in the house: her vision of the family they could have been if her mom hadn’t gone into heat.
“I hope you’re ready for this,” Hamish grumbled as he reached for the knob. “And grateful.”
Dorie’s heart sank. There was that word again. How many times had Joshua warned her that she wasn’t grateful enough? Especially to the Benefactor, who’d decided to show her grace despite her being toothless.
Maybe he was right, Dorie thought as she followed Hamish through the front door. If she had been more grateful, maybe her wish come true wouldn’t have turned into a nightma—"
“Oh, my goodness, Dorie! Dorie!”
Maem came running towards her and enveloped her in a bear hug before Dorie could finish her miserable hypothesis. Her mother squeezed her so tight, Dorie feared she might be smothered.
However, any joy her mother's surprisingly enthusiastic greeting might have brought her faded in an instant. Maem smelled completely new. Like a mix of her mate and the baby, she was carrying. A …
She couldn’t say the word—couldn’t even think it. She just pulled out of her mother's hug with a sunken heart.
Alban wasn’t even here, Dorie noted, looking around the front room. Dorie guessed he had better things to do than wait for her to get there.
“Why aren’t you hugging me back? Are you alright?”
To Dorie’s surprise, Maem cupped her shoulders and scanned her face with the familiar mix of worry and over-protection. Then she asked Hamish. “Is she alright? What happened at the castle? Oh, I knew leaving you there for so long was a bad idea. Look at your hair!”
Maem fingered her daughter’s sloppy curly puff as if it was a sure sign that Dorie had come to rot and ruin.
Dorie didn’t know whether to be happy or wary. Was this some kind of act to make her feel okay with being regulated to the role of helpmate? Maybe her mother didn't understand how much she loved going to the kingdom school.
“The only thing that happened at the castle was that sister of yours spoiling her rotten. Calling her princess as if she was in the direct line and not a duchess. I swear, that queen of ours hasn’t even taken a glance at the rule book.”
Maem conceded Hamish’s point with a slight tilt of her head. “Tara’s never been one for rule-following,” she admitted with a laugh.
Her maem looked so happy—positively glowing. Seeing her like this lightened Dorie’s mood a little.
If she were going to have to become the new helpmate, then at least she’d be helping a happy mother. There was some solace in that, she supposed.
“Okay, I am starving,” Maem said, interrupting Dorie’s bittersweet thoughts. “C’mon, Dorie, let me show you where you’ll be sleeping, then we’ll have lunch.”
Dorie didn’t know why her heart sank even further when her mother told her that. Of course, she wouldn’t be sharing a room with Maem anymore. Back in PEI, one of her former classmates had been kicked out of her room and moved into the hallway closet when her new brother was born.
But couldn't Alban and her mother have waited until after the birth to relocate her?
Dorie’s shoes felt like they were full of lead as she followed her mother up the stairs.
Then she frowned when instead of opening the closet door, Maem walked right past it to a door at the end of the hall—a door that always stayed locked. The one Hamish had called “not a topic for children” when she'd tried to ask him about it.
But Maem just turned the knob and walked right in.
Dorie’s steps stuttered. She didn’t understand.
“Where’s the lass, then?” Dorie heard Alban ask on the other side of the door.
“Wow, you are excited. Don’t worry, she’s right behind me,” Maem answered with a laugh, but then her voice took on a confused note. “At least she was right behind me. Dorie? Dorie?”
“Go on, then. Get in there.” Dorie didn’t realize Hamish had followed them up the stairs until he suddenly spoke up behind her. “You think I did all this emotional work just to have ye drag yer feet?”
Dorie didn’t understand what was happening. But she walked forward in a helpless trance of confusion and curiosity despite herself.
Then stopped short again when she saw the room.
Just a few feet away from a window spilling in light, a little bed sat above a fluffy carpet. And both were pink, her favorite color!
In the middle of the room, she found a cozy reading nook with a tall bookshelf filled with her favorite books and a girl-sized version of Hamish’s armchair from downstairs. Dorie could just imagine herself curling up in it to read and re-read her favorite stories.
On the other side of the bookshelf sat a wooden desk with one of those big, black rollie chairs!
The walls were painted pink—very recently, from the smell of it.
And to her shock, they were lined in the canvases she had painted in art class.
Best of all, strings of lights were strewn over her bed and across the ceiling—just enough to make the room feel magical.
The room was magical.
It was everything—everything she’d ever secretly dreamed of while living her plain life back in Canada. With a few details, she couldn’t have possibly imagined on top.
Dorie took one long look around the bedroom and immediately burst into tears.
“Aw, you hate it,” Alban said, his voice regretful. “I’m sorry. Your ma and me did our best to figure out what you’d want in a room of your own.”
“Wha-What?” Dorie rasped.
Her maem and Alban were supposed to be on their bairnmoon, but they’d put work into making this room for her. And now, Alban actually thought there was some way she could ever dislike it.
That thought made her cry even harder.
“See, I told you when you came by the castle to ask me about repurposing this room that you should just wait and let the lass have her say!” Hamish grumbled at his son. “Now look at her. You’ve ruined her whole day, haven’t you?”
Hamish gave his approval for gifting her this room? Had even spoken to Alban about it behind her back?
Huge sobs racked through Dorie’s body. Her shoulders shook so hard that her mother couldn’t give her a hug.
“Dinnae cry, lass.” As strong and tough as Alban was, he looked on the verge of bursting into tears, too. And his voice carried a desperate note as he told her, “We can take everything down and make it more to your liking.”
“No! Don’t you ever!” Dorie choked out. “I love it! I love it so much!”
Alban's face went from regretful to perplexed. “Then why are you crying?”
“For the same reason, I have to keep pinching myself to make sure I’m not dreaming,” Maem answered in her daughter’s stead.
“There’s a desk!” Dorie turned to her mother. “Does that mean I don’t have to quit school and become the new helpmate?”
Maem widened her eyes at Dorie’s question, then she shook her head.
“Oh no, I should have considered that you’d assume that.
But we’re not in our old village anymore.
We’re all going to be a happy family, helping each other as best we can, day in and day out.
And I don’t love the kingdom school, but if you want to keep going—”
“I do! I do! More than anything!” Dorie assured her. “I want to go to school and help Hamish with the chickens and be a good big sister, and get really good at Scots and Irish, and … and …”
There were many other items on her list, but Dorie was overcome with another wave of tears.
“Aw, Dorie …” Dorie had calmed down enough for Maem to pull her back into her arms for another hug. This one was just as tight as the one downstairs and twice as comforting. “We’re not used to being this happy, are we?”
No, no, they weren’t.
But her mother’s understanding helped. Dorie finally managed to sniffle to a stop. Then she pulled back from her mother’s arms to tell her new family, “Thank you.”
She opened her mouth to ask them another question—only to snap it closed.
“What is it?” Alban asked her, nonetheless. “You have the same look on your face my mate gets when she has a question and isn’t sure she should ask.”
He was already calling Maem his mate. A little bit more of the frost that had formed around Dorie’s heart melted away.
And yes, she had been forbidden to ask about this back in Saint Albert Village. But they weren’t in Canada anymore. Maybe it would be okay.
Maybe everything would be okay.
With that hope burning bright in her chest, she asked Maem and Alban, “Do you want to know if it’s a boy or a girl?”