Manhattan towers over Brooklyn like an over-achieving elder sibling and I feel like I've lived in its shadow my entire life. Remi and I always used to say we'd live there one day. And not just any place, one of those stupidly expensive apartments at the top of a tower block, staring down on the rest of the world, sneering at them and knowing that you've made it. The sort of apartment, which I was now on my way to in the back of a black limousine, which Christoph drove.

"Why does a god need an apartment?" I asked.

Nico shrugged. "Everyone wants a pad in Manhattan."

Weirdly, I found this more surreal than visiting the gods’ home on Mount Olympus. It was astonishing that they were real and it existed, but that was where they were meant to be. It was when surreality impinged on reality that it became truly odd - when the gods imposed into the real world.

"Dolos..."

"All glory to Dolos!"

"... doesn't spend much time on Olympus these days," Alexei explained. "He's always found humans entertaining, and when he's not watching them, he likes to live among them. He's got homes all over the world."

"And women?" I asked, sharply.

Alexei chose not to answer, still preferring not to say anything too negative about his master.

We pulled up at the base of a spectacular tower block, the entrance lobby looking like a scaled down version of Mount Olympus. Red-suited doormen rushed to meet us, opening doors, grabbing bags; they would have carried us over the threshold if we'd asked.

"So Dad's not here at the moment?" I checked. I still wasn't keen on actually meeting him, though it was irritating how swiftly I'd slipped into calling him 'Dad'.

"No." Alexei shook his head. "As I say, he has homes all around the world."

"And he won't mind us crashing in this one?"

"You're his daughter - how could he possibly object?"

"True." I decided to comprehensively trash the place before leaving. Maybe scrawl my mom's name across his bedroom wall in indelible ink.

Another red suit ushered us into an elevator, which shot upwards like a bullet from a gun. It had a long way to go. At the top, we were ushered out again and Alexei produced a key card. The door opened.

In hindsight, I was ashamed about how impressed I was when the door opened to reveal the apartment beyond. I should have been angry on the instant - he was living like this while my mom was barely getting by? How was that fair? Bastard.

The door had given way to a vast living area, one entire wall of which was glass, looking out over the city and, it seemed to me, the whole damn world.

"Gods like to live in the air," said Nico. "Up among the clouds."

The furniture was ultra-modern and each piece probably cost more than I earned in a year. In one wall, an impressive, baronial fireplace was set - probably airlifted in from a decaying European chateau. Nico clapped his hands and the fire sprang into life, making me yelp in shock. Above the fire, in a gold frame, hung a life-size picture, which gave me my first glimpse of the man who I reluctantly accepted to be my father. I wanted to say something cutting about the ego necessary to have a lavish picture of yourself dominating your home, but other thoughts were already prevalent in my mind. There was a resemblance. Much as I hated to acknowledge it, the man in the picture had my thick dark hair and stubborn chin. I wondered if my eyes sparkled with mischief the way his did. It was not like looking into a mirror, it was more like looking at my own dark side, the Mr. Hyde to my Dr. Jekyll. And, it had to be said, my dark side was a big part of my personality, especially these days. As I looked at the picture, I privately vowed to live better, to be more like my mom, to embrace what light side I still had left before it was all gone. Anything to be less like the man in the picture; Dolos, god of tricksters, my father.

With wonder and curiosity now sated, my brain seemed to find space for anger to get a look in and I felt my fists clench involuntarily as I continued to stare at the portrait. How dare he smile? What did he find funny about the way he had treated my mother? He wasn't worthy to lick her boots or look at me.

"Do you think he'll be on Mount Olympus next time I visit?" I asked. "You know, after I've completed the tasks."

"I'm sure he will be," replied Alexei. "You would like to meet him?"

"Oh, very much," I snarled.

Alexei nodded, perhaps a little disappointed. "I understand."

"No, Alexei, you don't."

"Perhaps not. Let me show you around."

There was no denying that this place was big enough to house the four of us comfortably. There were enough bedrooms and bathrooms, and a kitchen large enough to feed an army, although it looked as if it had never been used - I could not picture 'Dad' cooking.

"Why are there rails in the floor?" I asked as we entered a long corridor.

Alexei said nothing, but gently moved me to one side as a small train, like the ones you get at fairgrounds for little kids to ride, puffed past.

"It's a very long corridor," Alexei said, as if that was an explanation.

"What are all these rooms?" I asked. We already seemed to have seen the essentials.

"Closets."

"All of them?"

"This is the shirt room."

Alexei opened a door and we entered a dressing room with a long mirror on the wall. To either side of us were rails of expensive shirts. Wordlessly, Alexei pressed a button in the wall and the rail beside it moved back to make room for another, which descended from the ceiling.

"Would you like to see the revolving, hexagonal, shoe columns?" asked Alexei, as if that was a normal question.

"I'm good."

There were ten rooms off the corridor of closets, and Alexei explained to me how my father would put his clothing options for the day onto the train and travel up and down until he found an ensemble he liked. My opinion of the man was not improving.

Music played from the walls as we walked to our next destination. The style of music could be changed at word, as could the lighting. It was hard for me not to think how useful all this would be in the art of seduction. And harder still not to wonder if my mother had been shown around this place. Had all this stuff worked on her?

"And this is the library."

I'm not a big reader myself, but I respect reading in others, and the fact that he had a library was probably the best thing I had heard about my father so far. At first glance it appeared a lavish, but relatively ordinary, library. I should have known better.

"Austen, Jane," Alexei said into an intercom by the door, and a moment later a shelf of books kerchunked into place in a vacant slot in the wall, displaying the complete works of Jane Austen. "Or you can just state a genre and it will bring you a selection," said Alexei. I couldn't tell if he was trying to impress me or just giving me an idea of who my father was and leaving me to make up my own mind. I guess there were people who would be impressed by this ostentatious level of wealth, and no doubt my father had used it to his advantage with his women.

"Has he read all these books?" I asked, perhaps trying to cling to the one crumb of optimism I had.

But Alexei shook his head. "He's not a big reader."

There went the crumb, but of course that was another thing I had in common with Dolos.

"Let me show you your room," said Alexei, sensing that I was not impressed.

"Great."

We took the escalator.

In a poor frame of mind though I might have been, it would have taken someone more ungrateful than me to make sarcastic or caustic comments about my bedroom.

"You like it?" asked Alexei.

"Yeah," I admitted, grinning a bit. "Yeah, I do."

The bed was the largest I had ever seen, as if it had been designed by a man who thought an orgy should be conducted in comfort. The huge windows gave a bird's eye view of the city and curved slightly as the whole of the outer wall arced at the top, leading to a circular skylight above the bed, letting in glorious sunlight through its multi-colored panes. The carpet was thick enough to lose your foot, and warm enough to suggest under-floor heating. To the left as I entered was the door to the en suite bathroom, containing a bath which was presumably designed by the same man who had done the bed, more under-floor heating, towels so fluffy they looked like discarded muppets, and something that had to be a shower but was like no other shower I had ever seen.

"What the hell is that?" I asked, regarding the alcove set into the wall, lined with nozzles and peppered with holes.

"The shower," said Alexei, confirming my suspicions.

"Looks like something an undertaker would use to embalm a body."

"It's an all-over shower," Alexei explained.

"Aren't all showers all-over showers?"

"You can wash yourself all over with any shower," said Alexei. "But they aren't showering you all over. This one... Let me show you."

He leaned into the alcove and opened a panel to reveal an array of waterproof knobs, levers, dials and buttons.

"Does it play a tune?" I suggested.

Alexei beamed a smile, twisted a knob and pressed a button. A nozzle on the wall of the shower sprayed a mist of fine droplets.

"So it comes at you from the side as well," Alexei said. "And you can adjust how vigorously." He twisted a knob and the mist turned to a deluge. "Or you can just have downpour." Another lever and the whole roof of the shower rained water down like a tropical monsoon. "Or," Alexei went on, "if you're in the mood." Another button pressed, another lever pulled, and a fountain of water rose up from the floor, guaranteed to give the unwary occupant the shock of their life. "Not everyone likes that one," Alexei admitted as he switched all the water off and dried his arm. "Others find it quite stimulating."

I wasn't about to admit it, but I couldn't wait to try it out.

"It's a beautiful room," I said.

Alexei beamed again. "We're glad you like it. It's the best room in the place."

The words instantly worried me. "This isn't... Tell me this isn't his room." I couldn't sleep in my father's bedroom, where he had had so many women, perhaps even my mom, in the bed in which perhaps I had been... I didn't want to think about it.

"No," Alexei hastened to set my mind at rest. "Perhaps we should call this the second best bedroom."

I nodded. "Sorry."

I had been taking some of my anger at my father out on Alexei and that hadn't been fair. As I looked at him now, I realized that I had been so caught up in tasks and learning more about my father and my divine relatives, I had barely given any thought to the other problem that wasn't going anywhere; my feelings for my protectors and theirs for me. We were now all living together. They had already made it clear that, to them, this was an open opportunity with no recriminations. How did I feel about that?

I decided to put that question, for now at least, onto the increasingly long list of things that I would rather not think about. I still found them attractive and the possibilities of the situation still thrilled and excited me. But the reality of it still made me uncomfortable. I had decided not to pursue any of them, and was determined to stick to that.

"Get settled in," said Alexei, as he headed for the door. “We'll meet in the living room in half an hour to open the scroll."

"How do I find my way back?" The route we'd taken through the place was complex and circuitous - it shouldn't have been possible to lose your way in an apartment, but in this one, anyone could.

"Just tap one of the wall panels and ask the way," said Alexei, matter of factly. "They're all very helpful."

Half an hour later, we were all seated in the living room, the afternoon light streaming through the huge glass wall. I took the scroll reverently from my bag.

"Do I read it?"

Alexei nodded. "They're your tasks. We're just here to help."

With trembling fingers, I unknotted the fastening ribbon and unfurled the parchment. Emblazoned across the center, in a neat hand, was the first task. The guys unconsciously crowded around me to peer in, their muscular bodies blocking out the sunlight.

I read the task out loud. "Find a queen willing to sacrifice her crown."

It had begun.