The blue message flashes in the air above the android’s domed head. Private. For the attention of Miss Jane Anas. Blue is the colour reserved for official state messages. It’s the first such message I’ve ever received and can only be about one thing.

“Open message,” I instruct the android.

There’s a slight pause as it authenticates my voice, then the private message pad slides out from a slot in the android’s torso. The message glows on the black screen. At the top is the royal standard: a crown above a shield emblazoned with three roaring lions. The fact that no sound accompanies the message makes them no less menacing. On either side of the shield stands an olive tree, their branches shading the royal crest. Cats wind their way around the withered trunks in a hypnotizing blur of movement.

Below the standard, the message header proclaims this to be an official communication of the Court of King Lutherin. The message gets straight to the point. It invites me to attend the Selection Day being held in the village in seven days’ time. Attendance is mandatory.

One week from now. The day after my eighteenth birthday. I shove the message pad roughly back into its slot, the android whirring in protest at the rough treatment, and walk to the large window which overlooks the river.

Up in the village, six other girls will be receiving the same message, though I suspect their reaction will be rather different. For them, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. They will have been planning for the Selection Day for months. Trying out different hairstyles and beauty treatments to see which enhances their looks the most. Spending money their parents don’t have on a new dress. For me, this is my final shaming. The final chance they will have to mock me. And that’s the only reason I am looking forward to it.

The Selection Days are held every year at the end of summer. You are invited to attend the event that follows your eighteenth birthday. At eighteen, you are officially a woman and are allowed to marry, to start a business, and leave home. Or, if you are beautiful enough to be chosen, join the ranks of the Swans.

Becoming a Swan is every young girl’s dream. But it’s not a dream I’ve ever allowed myself to have. What’s the point in wasting time thinking about something that could never come true? I long ago resigned myself to always being plain Jane. And really, that’s not so bad. My heart is here, at the farm, not in the big city. Besides, I’m sure there must be a price to pay for all that beauty and riches.

“Jane? Was that your summons?”

I turn at my father’s voice. He stands, wheezing, in the cracked wooden doorway to the sitting room. His knuckles are white on the carved oak cane that seems to be the only thing keeping him upright.

“Are you sure you should be up?” I cross the room in four long strides and grasp his arm, helping him over to the spongy old sofa. His face is etched with lines of pain and his skin has a yellowish tinge that I know can’t be healthy. But when he looks up at me his smile is as warm as always.

“You’re as bad as your mother, fussing over me. Proper mother hens, both of you.”

Has it only been six months since he was struck down by this illness? In that time, he has aged years, his once strong muscles wasting away so he is now half the man he was. My throat constricts and I bite my lip and turn away so he can’t see the tears that threaten to spill from my eyes.

“Have you been taking your medicine, Jane?”

The concern in his voice grabs my attention. “Of course,” I answer, surprised at the question. “But I wish you’d let me stop. I don’t feel ill at all and you are in much more need of medicine than I.”

A short laugh rattles his thin frame. “Dr Odekele says you only need take it for another two months. Then we can buy my medicine. The crops have done well this year. If we can get a good price at market, then we can afford medicine for both of us.”

I bow my head and pat his hand. Two months. I’m not sure he has that long. He gets thinner and weaker every day. And I get stronger. I don’t feel in the slightest bit ill. Apparently, I was born with a genetic abnormality, which means I have to take these blue pills twice a day. They’re expensive — I’ve seen the bills. Too expensive. But whenever I suggest to my parents that I stop, the pain in their eyes is too much for me to bear, and I drop the subject.

I dare not tell my father that the harvest hasn’t been as good as he’d hoped. Not because we haven’t had the conditions for it, but as hard as I try, I can’t do the work of two people. Father hasn’t left the house for three months and we had to let the farmhand go four weeks ago. Since then, it’s just been me, my mother when she hasn’t been nursing Father, and Rafe, in the few spare hours he has after work.

“Perhaps Stefan or Esme could come back for a couple of weeks?” I suggest. “Just to help out with harvesting the fruit and setting the hydroponic chambers up again? I could really use Stefan’s help with the androids — one has developed a fault and even Rafe can’t work out how to fix it.”

The idea of my brother and sister visiting hardly fills me with joy. Whilst they tolerated me as a child, they were never kind. Perhaps it was just because they were so much older, already in their teens by the time I came along. Or perhaps they teased me for the same reason as the other children in the village. Because I’m ugly.

My father sighs. “I did message them last week but haven’t had a reply. They must be busy.”

Too busy to respond to a message from their sick father. I know Mother’s messaged them several times about his illness. They sent good wishes but said they were too busy to visit. Since they left the farmhouse for the city ten years ago, they’ve only been back to visit once. It’s not as if we’re far away — barely three miles from the palace, which lies on the outskirts of the city — but as far as they’re concerned, it could be a different world. They haven’t even brought their children to see their grandparents. They talk to us through the VR system, but virtual reality isn’t the same as actually being here.

“I’m sorry, Jane, that all the work has been falling to you. But let’s just get your Selection Day out of the way and then …” His voice trails off and I know what he’s thinking.

I rest my hand on his, feeling the papery skin move over his swollen knuckle joints. “Don’t worry, Father. I have no desire to go off to the city. I love being here on the farm.”

“You should have a new dress,” he muses.

“And what would I do with a new dress? I don’t wear them. Besides, a pretty dress can’t transform someone into a beauty, whatever the village girls may think.”

I think back to Esme’s Selection Day. My parents had saved for years to buy her a dress of the latest fashion and, when she wasn’t selected, she’d blamed them for not buying her the more expensive dress she had lusted after. Not that it would have made any difference. Esme was pretty, but not the order of beauty the Swans were looking for.

Girls from our village weren’t chosen very often. I can only remember three and their families had left the village shortly after their selection; the money from their daughter’s choosing sufficient enough to buy a place in a more prosperous village or town.

I glance down and find my father staring at me, scanning my face with his faded blue eyes. “You are more beautiful than you think, Jane,” he says quietly. But in his eyes is not pity or love, but fear.

* * *

The sun is high in the sky as I make my way around the hydroponics chambers. The climate inside is perfectly regulated for the different plants; the chambers heated or cooled, depending on the season. The system is powered by the vast arrays of solar panels on the roofs of the pig pens. Fortunately, the pigs require less maintenance than the plants. You just have to remember to keep their food bins topped up.

The Anas family has farmed this land for generations, back to the times when birds flew down from the sky to nest by the river. The farmhouse itself is a couple of hundred years old, which is probably why bits of it keep crumbling away. Sometimes, I think it will collapse in on itself with us inside.

The house sits on a bank high above the river, protected from all but the worst floods. Below it, tall burdock leaves line the river banks. When I was little, I used to hide in them and pretend I was deep in the forest. On hot summer days, I’d wind my way through to the river and plunge into the cool, refreshing water. Father used to call me his duckling as I was so fond of swimming. But in the past few years, the floods have caused the banks to become slippery and dangerous and the current is too strong even for me to swim in.

The hydroponics chambers stretch out along the river bank. Further up the hill, the pigs bask on the sun-baked earth. Behind them lie our neighbour’s fields and then the village. On the other side of the farmhouse is what remains of the old forest, a mix of ancient oak and beech woodland and pine plantation. It stretches around the village and up to the walls of the city. When you’re under the tall trees, you can’t see the shimmering glass towers that stretch up into the sky. You can almost forget that the city is there at all.

Once I’ve done the rounds of the chambers, I head back to the house for lunch. At least, being farmers, we never go hungry. Even with the super-efficient chambers, there are always some fruit and vegetables that ripen too fast, or grow in odd, distorted ways and can’t be sold.

There’s another message waiting for me when I get back. Orange, which means it’s from the school. My mouth feels suddenly dry and my stomach gives an unpleasant lurch.

“Is it your exam results?” My mother looks over from the chiller cabinet.

I nod and pass my finger over the screen to open the message. I scan the contents and my nervousness turns to relief.

“How did you do?”

I smile. “Middling to good.”

My mother rolls her eyes and comes to peer over my shoulder. “They’re great results, Jane!”

They are good results. Not the best, but pretty good for a poor farm girl. Good enough for entry to the agricultural college, if I could have afforded to go. When I was younger, I hated school, but once I was allowed to attend most lessons via the Interweb rather than traipsing up to the small village school, my grades rapidly improved, as did my enjoyment of the lessons. In the VR classroom, my avatar could look the same as any other teenager. Normal. I was no longer ostracized by the other children, ridiculed for the marks on my face and my clumsy movements.

We eat lunch in silence, which is odd given that my mother is usually as chatty as they come. I’d have thought she’d have been raving about my exam results if nothing else. But I guess Father’s illness is taking its toll on us all.

After we’ve eaten, I get up to clear the plates, but a hand on my arm stops me.

“Jane, sit down. There’s … there’s something we need to tell you.” My mother’s face is serious and she refuses to meet my eye. A coldness starts in the pit of my stomach, spreading outward as I sink back into my chair.

“What is it? Has the doctor said something about your illness?” I lick my dry lips and examine my father’s face more closely. But he just shakes his head.

“No, it’s nothing to do with that,” my mother continues. “It’s about you, Jane. We weren’t supposed to tell you until you turned eighteen, but with the Selection Day so soon after your birthday …”

“Tell me what?” My words come out as a croak.

My mother looks at my father who clears his throat. “We have always considered you to be our own child, Jane. We raised you from birth and sometimes even we forget that we’re not your biological parents.”

I stare at them. Did I hear that right? “You’re not my parents?”

“No. We adopted you when you were tiny — only a few days old. Your mother … wasn’t able to look after you.”

“Wasn’t able to look after me,” I repeat. The words echo in my head. I stare at the wooden kitchen table. There’s a pattern in the wood which has always reminded me of a bird’s head. It’s knotted eye glares at me balefully.

“Jane? Do you understand what we’re saying?” My mother’s voice sounds like a distant cry carried on the wind.

I lift my eyes to hers. “You’re not my parents?”

“I am not your birth mother. But you are a daughter to us. Your mother didn’t … couldn’t look after you.”

Something about the way she says this jolts my brain back into action. The fog clears and there’s a sharp stab of pain from my right hand. A broken fingernail. My heart thuds against my ribcage as I speak the words my mother refuses to say. “She didn’t want me?”

“No, Jane!” My mother places her hand over mine. Her touch burns. “Your mother wanted to protect you—”

“From what?” This high-pitched, bitter voice doesn’t sound like me, as much as I can feel my lips speaking the words. “Who is she?”

“You know I trained as a midwife, many years ago. Well, there weren’t very many of us — it wasn’t really seen as a career option as so many women were choosing to use artificial wombs rather than carrying their baby themselves. I used to work up at the palace occasionally, when one of the Swans fell pregnant.”

“You looked after the Swans?” My mouth drops open. The thought that my mother, a poor farmer’s wife, would have anything to do with the elite courtesans is impossible.

A slight smile lifts the corner of her mouth. “Well, sometimes their implants failed to work, or they weren’t as careful as they should have been. And of course, there were a few who the lords took as wives. On this occasion, it was an emergency. I was called in by a friend of mine. The lady was struggling with the birthing. She didn’t realise, but she was having twins. Both babies were born healthy, but she begged me to take you away and raise you as my own.

“We had lost a child of our own just a week before — he was still-born — and my milk was still flowing. All we had to do was tell people that the scans had been mistaken and I’d given birth to a girl instead of a boy.”

There’s a bitter taste in my mouth. I stare at them, these two people who I’d always believed were my parents. The people who’ve been lying to me for years. Their faces radiate concern, which turns to unease as the silence continues. My gut twists, acid turns my stomach to fire and I clamp my lips shut to prevent the scream that’s building inside me escaping. This feeling is like an old friend. You have to learn to control your anger, Jane. Breathe in and out. In and out.

Finally, I feel able to speak. “So, my mother was a Swan?”

My father nods.

I stand, my chair crashing to the stone floor. “So, why tell me this now? Isn’t it bad enough that I look like this,” I clasp my scarred, mottled face in my hands, “without you telling me that my own mother rejected me? That I was too ugly for her!”

Hot tears burn my cheeks and each breath becomes a struggle as the familiar sense of shame rises up inside me.

“No, that’s not true!” My mother — the woman I have always called ‘mother’ — reaches for me, but I pull away. “You don’t understand—”

But she’s wrong. I do understand. Completely. I may hide away from the world, but I’m not blind to the realities of it. Two babies: one beautiful, one ugly. It can’t have been a hard choice. Blinded by tears, I stumble over to the door that leads out into the yard, not heeding the cries of my parents calling me back.