I did not reply when i saw this because I wanted to think it through - I got the nastiest feeling that there is something I should remember but just not seeing. Maybe some of Gillian Bradshaw´s children books, maybe the Nubian ones, except I need a reread, I don´t remember them well enough! ( as a theme, it sounds awfully Bradshaw-ish so maybe I am inventing it) Trying to think of Eva Ibbotson also for some reason, but without any specific notion.