The Children of the King by Sonya Hartnett

you are running Heron Hall with efficiency, and perhaps giving Peregrine cause to wish he’d never been born. Home is very quiet without you, but I am getting a lot of work done without interruption. I miss you Dolly, and enclose this bangle which I hope will remind you of me. I saw it in a shop window and it seemed right to buy something pretty when everything is so serious . . .
“Oh, Daddy,” she sighed, sliding the bangle onto her arm. “Poor Daddy. What did you get, Jem? I got a bangle. Look, it’s lovely.”
    She twirled her wrist so the gold caught the light. “It suits my white arm,” she decided. She looked at May. “Still no letter for you, May?”
    “No.”
    The kindness of Cecily’s nature rose up to give her trouble. “Maybe your mum was busy. I’m sure she’ll send something — maybe tomorrow?”
    “It’s all right,” said May.
    “And if not tomorrow, probably the next day. She wouldn’t have forgotten you — not yet.”
    “Cecily! Leave her alone.”
    “It’s all right,” repeated May.
    But it was a sorry sight, the evacuee and her eggshell amid the ribbons and wrapping; it caused Cecily pain. A distraction occurred to her: “Uncle Peregrine, May was asking about those ruins by the river. What is that place? I’ve forgotten.”
    “Snow Castle. You should be careful there. Ruins can be dangerous.”
    “That’s what I said! Didn’t I, May?”
    “Snow Castle.”
May mused. “It sounds like something nice to eat.”
    “That’s not its real name though, is it?” Jeremy folded the paper and put it aside. “That’s just what local people call it.”
    Peregrine sat back in his seat, taking his teacup with him. Walls of sunlight boxed him in, making his chair a throne. “The true name of the castle isn’t known,” he said. “Flimsy things like words become lost in time. But some say the castle never had a name — that it was always a castle of no name. It was built at least five hundred years ago, maybe a hundred more.”
    “Golly,” said Cecily.
    “Hardly golly at all,” her uncle replied. “Old castles aren’t rare. Every well-to-do person’s house was a castle in those days, there were lots of them around. Most are ruins now, just broken stones and a few crumbling walls; even most of the grandest ones are lost. What does make Snow Castle unusual is the fact that much of its stone is marble — snow-white marble, originally.”
    “So whoever built the castle must have been someone grand.”
    Cecily swung to May, curls bouncing. “How do you know?”
    The girl, challenged, blushed a little. “Marble comes from Italy, where Michelangelo lived. So only a rich person could bring it all the way here and use it to build a house.”
    Peregrine smiled. “How do you know that, May? Do you have an interest in architecture?”
    The evacuee blushed pinker. “My dad taught me things.”
    “Is your father an architect? An artist?”
    “No; but on weekends we used to go to the museum to see the paintings and the stuffed animals and the fossils, and he used to tell me things.”
    “I’m scared of those stiff animals.” Cecily boggled her eyes.
    “The animals were my favourite,” said May. “We always visited them first. I like the walrus. Then we see the mummy in the sarcophagus, he is Dad’s favourite. I like the mummy too. Then we visit the icons and the head-hunters, and after we’ve looked at everything we . . .” She paused, glanced up.
    “You what?” asked Cecily.
    The girl seemed to have forgotten what she meant to say. Then she spoke with a start. “We’d get ice-cream if it was a warm day, and chips if it was cold.”
    She looked down at her plate. Peregrine Lockwood ate the last slice of pear, contemplating her. Jeremy said, “The land around here is full of artefacts — Iron Age metal, Roman glass. We’ll go digging if you like, find a gift for your father.”
    Jealous Cecily said, “What would anyone want with a bit of old glass? Look, May, I’ve got