Without any further deliberation, they settled down to the various tasks that had to be done, the mood changing from shock to a businesslike urgency. Lena took charge of the campsite, volunteering to get a meal together for Kara, Alex and Mon-El when they returned. Brainy quickly rekindled the dying embers of last night's fire and went off in search of more wood to build it up; this was unfamiliar country, and Kara would need the light to find her way back. At the back of her mind a little inkling of worry pushed, concern that the fire might attract enemies or thieves, or worse the dragon in the dark, but she had no time to worry about that now. All that mattered, in this moment, was Alex.

She wasted no time in saddling Mayarah, mounting up on the golden mare and spurring her into a swift canter, pausing only to call a hurried goodbye to the others. Then she was off, making her way back toward Daxam, following her sister's trail.

They couldn't have gotten far. That was what Kara kept telling herself as a reassuring mantra, a reminder that her efforts were not in vain. They wouldn't have been riding as hard or as fast as she was; she could close the distance between them and have them all back at the campsite by sundown. She could do it. She had to. She couldn't fathom the rest of the quest without Alex. She had never been without Alex at her side before.

There was guilt starting to set in too, now. She hadn't done this for J'onn or M'gann or Winn. When they had left, she had just let it happen, barely done a thing to stop them. Should she have tried harder, done more to keep her little band of adventurers together? Should she have done for the others what she was doing for Alex, refusing to go on until she got her sister back?

Maybe. Maybe she should have. But she couldn't change the past, and she couldn't set it right, not right now. Right now it was her sister who had to be her priority. The others, however and whenever they were reunited, would understand the bond between Kara and Alex, a bond like no other. They would understand that Kara had started the quest with Alex and was bound and determined to finish it the same way.

She threw caution to the winds, calling out Alex and Mon-El's names over and over as the forest flashed by. She didn't care who heard her or what attention she might attract. She just wanted her best friend back. Her heart was pounding wildly, and she found it hard to focus, to settle herself to the task at hand. All the emotion of everything that had happened over the past few weeks, all the feelings that she hadn't had time to deal with properly, had reached their breaking point and were now boiling over inside her. Sadness, grief for the friends she had lost, fear for Alex, fury for the curse that had sent her life spiraling onto this wild, unexpected path- she felt it she had no idea how to cope.

So she did the only thing she knew how to do. She pushed the feelings down, telling herself that she'd work through them later, once she had brought Mon-El and Alex safely back. Right now she needed to concentrate on the mission at hand. This was the only day she would have to search; Cat had said she had a couple months before the remainder of her curse took effect, and that time was quickly running out. No matter how much she dreaded the idea of continuing the quest without Alex, she would have no other choice if she couldn't find her today.

And if she didn't catch up to them before they reached Daxam and found Maxwell Lord...well, Kara shuddered to think what might happen. The wizard was vengeful. Alex's curse proved that. And no matter how brave Alex was, the form she was in meant that she wouldn't be much of a threat to someone with so much dark magic at their fingertips. The first run-in with Lord had already gone so very wrong. The second one might be unimaginably worse.

"But it won't be," Kara said out loud. "It won't be, because I won't let it. They won't get that far. I'll find them, and I'll stop them, and we'll break Alex's curse some other way. Together, just like we do everything else. We'll finish this quest together."

For a while, the statement helped to keep her spirits up. But it seemed that Alex and Mon-El had been riding faster than she thought. The day wore on, morning changing to afternoon, and still she found no sign of them. By the time dusk was falling, and sunset was painting the sky in streaks of red and rose, Kara had to admit it. She had failed. She had run out of time. She had to turn back, return to the campsite and continue to the Luthor kingdom without her sister.

She battled with herself for as long as she could, but eventually reason won out. It was the hardest thing she had ever done to turn her horse around, and she found herself wiping away tears as she rode back toward the campsite. She had never imagined something like this. When she had started the quest, she had never imagined that this would happen. The journey had already been hard, but now the road ahead looked impossible.

The sun had almost completely set by the time she spotted Brainy's signal fire in the distance. It was a comforting sight, but also a painful one. She dreaded having to tell Brainy and Lena that she hadn't found their missing friends, but there was no help for it. She urged Mayarah to pick up the pace again, eager to be back at the campsite before darkness fell completely.

But when she rode back into the clearing, she found the place empty. The fire was burning brightly, but there was no one beside it. All their possessions were still there, and Brainy and Lena's horses were still tied to the same tree they had been tied to this morning, but Brainy and Lena themselves were nowhere to be seen.

Panic took her heart in its fist and squeezed. She tried desperately to force it back, telling herself that she had to remain calm. She didn't know for sure that anything had happened. Maybe they had just wandered off.

"Brainy?" she called out. Her voice sounded louder in the silence, and more shaky than she would have liked. "Lena?"

For a single, sickening moment there was no reply. And then Brainy's voice rang out. "Kara? Oh, thank goodness. Kara, you need to come with me. Quickly."

Kara's eyes widened. She had never heard Brainy speak so loudly or so hurriedly. There was alarm in his voice, a tinge of fear, though he remained for the most part as calm as ever. Once again, something was wrong. Kara was getting tired of things being wrong.

"Brainy, what is it?" she said, stepping forward to meet the huntsman as he hurried across the clearing. "Where's Lena?"

"She's...she's over here. Kara, I don't know what happened. I came back and found her like this. I didn't know what to do, so I waited for you. I think...I think perhaps it might be magic."

"What might be magic?" Kara asked, speeding up to match Brainy's hurried pace. Thoughts of the dragon sprang to her mind, and this time she didn't push them back. Had Lena done something? Showed her true Luthor colors and revealed herself as the mastermind behind the dragon in the dark? It seemed almost impossible, but what else would cause this level of alarm from someone usually as composed as Brainy was? "Brainy, just tell me what happened. What has Lena-"

She stopped. A cold chill ran up her spine, and a hard lump settled into her stomach as her hands flew to her mouth.

The scene that met her eyes, at first, seemed idyllic. The grassy hillside, spotted with bright little wildflowers, bathed in the last light of the setting sun. And lying on the grass, her eyes closed as if in a deep sleep, one hand outstretched, lay Princess Lena Luthor, her dark hair spilling like a silken sheet around her.

"I can't wake her," Brainy whispered. "I tried...I couldn't even find a pulse. I thought you might know, since you've been through a sleeping curse, if this is one of them, or if she's..." He couldn't finish, shaking his head helplessly.

Heart in her throat, Kara darted forward and fell to her knees at Lena's side, seizing the girl's wrist. She was deathly still; as Brainy had said, there was no sign of life. This was no sleeping curse.

As she shifted position, leaning over Lena to try to catch just the faintest hint of a breath, her knee struck against something. Something hard, that rolled away when she struck it. She leaned down, picking the item up and examining it in confusion. An apple. A large, perfect red apple with a single bite missing.

"Brainy?" Kara called. "Where did this come from?" There were no apples in their food supply, no trees growing anywhere close. She ran a finger over the bite mark.

And just as quickly snatched her finger away as the fruit grew suddenly hot. The apple tumbled to the ground, and Kara watched in horror and fascination as the exposed flesh of the fruit turned from a soft yellow-white to a foreboding blackish green. The apple sizzled, and a little trail of violet smoke rose up from it. There could be no doubt now. This was magic. Magic of the darkest kind.

"How did this happen?" Kara asked no one in particular. "Who could have done this?"

Brainy caught his breath. "Look," he said softly. "On the other side, see?" He reached out, gingerly, to rotate the apple. Emblazoned in gold on the ruby-red fruit were two letters in sharp, spidery script, beautiful and cruel all at once. Two L's, intertwined together.

"Lillian," Brainy said. "That's Lillian's mark. I've seen it a hundred times, I would know it anywhere. She must have gotten better at dark magic. She's probably known where Lena was since we left the cottage and the dwarves' protection. She waited until Lena was alone, like today, and then she struck. I don't know if she disguised herself, or...or what she did. But it worked. She has her revenge."

The words, as true as they were, made Kara sick at heart. She had almost managed to forget Lillian with all the other dangers they had faced. The exiled Luthor queen had seemed so far removed, such a distant threat, and now she proved that she had been watching all along, a peril Kara had never thought to watch for. No, this was no sleeping curse. This was deadly. This was cruel. And how someone, even a Luthor, could inflict such a terrible thing on their own adoptive daughter...it was shocking, horrific even to think about. Kara had known the way the Luthors were, but this was stooping to a level she could hardly imagine even from a family like theirs. This was not a loss like J'onn, or M'gann, or Winn. This was permanent. This was a failure that could not be reversed. From this, there was no going back. The poisoned apple was forever.

Suddenly the terrible realization dawned. Suddenly Kara understood. She fell back and dropped Lena's hand, a little gasp escaping her lips. Brainy looked at her in concern.

"It was Lena's," Kara whispered. "Lena's all along."

"What was?" Brainy asked, and Kara turned to look at him, her voice heavy and hopeless.

"The fourth curse," she answered. "This is the fourth curse."