Page 73 of Omega's Flight

"Yes." Lysoon, he wanted to say more, but the more you poked at Quin, the less he was likely to say.

"The best explanation we've been able to come up with is that it's something like what Jason does in the garden. He goes through the plants and picks out the ones that aren't growing where they should, then pinches them off or pulls them out by the roots so they don't interfere with the good plants." He reached for Holland's hand with his free one and laced their fingers together. "Holland does that with my memories, goes through and finds the ones that are setting off the flashbacks and he pinches off the emotion that goes with them. I can remember them, but the way I feel about them has dimmed. Like turning down a lamp." He laid a gentle kiss on Holland's cheek, then, in a sarcastic tone, said, "Close your mouth, little brother, before the flies get in."

Huh? Cas snapped his jaw shut and stared at his relatives while his brain whirred and clunked as it tried to absorb this matter of fact explanation of the half-explained concepts written in the journal. "So, Cosimo was right in what he said? That omegas can go into your head and just snip, and then you forget things?"

Holland shook his head. "Not every omega, and we can't remove it entirely. Or at least, I can't." He sounded frustrated by that.

"It's probably just as well," Quin told him, running his hand up and down Holland's arm in a comforting gesture. "We don't know what kind of effect that would have, if I couldn't remember those times. And some of them, it was the last time I saw those guys alive. I don't want to forget them."

Holland sighed and watched as Quin lifted his hand to kiss the knuckles. "Well, I won't argue with you about that."

"I hope not." Quin snorted and let Holland's hand fall. "As for you," he said, turning back to Cas. "Not a word of this to anyone."

"I still have questions." And he wasn't leaving until they were answered.

"Why am I not surprised?" Quin muttered. He rubbed his hand through his hair and then used it to prop his head up against the back of the couch. "Okay. Ask your questions." His words took Cas right back to childhood, when he used to follow Quin around pestering him to explain everything, from the color of the sky, to the height of the walls, to where Mom was today. From the look on Quin's face, he was probably feeling the same thing.

Now that he had permission, he suddenly wasn't sure where to start. But he had to start somewhere, or Quin would decide that he'd changed his mind. "Not every omega can do this, right?"

Quin nodded, Holland too, just a moment behind him.

"Does every omega have some weird talent? Like Bram?"

Holland rubbed the side of a finger along his mouth, then set it back on Quin's chest. "We don't know. Mostly, we don't know what we're looking for, so the best answer we can give you is maybe?" He grimaced. "Jason obviously has a touch with the plants—we're assuming it's an omega talent, from what his mother used to say about it and just how much greener his thumb is than the other green thumbs."

"And Bram?" That had been fascinating, and frightening. But if it could be controlled, their hospital had one-up on the humans.

"Bram too," Holland agreed. "He's got a healer's touch, if we can just get him to slow down long enough to use it properly. He's trying to do things with it that I think he needs more practice for. Though I can see why he feels like he needs to rush. If he can fix things inside us, then we might not lose people to stupid accidents, or heart attacks, or other things. But I don't want to lose people to him over-reaching while he’s learning, either.”

"Bax?" Cas wanted to know, though the one he wanted most to know about, he didn't dare ask.

Holland opened his mouth, then looked at his mate with a slightly puzzled expression.

"We're not sure," Quin said slowly. "He's hard to pin down."

"He was always very organized. Or, no, that's not right." Holland frowned and tapped his fingers against Quin's chest. "It's not that he's more organized than the rest of us—some of us—" his lips twitched and he rolled his eyes toward Quin, who was doing a poor job of keeping his own face straight. "Stop laughing, you. It's not funny. Poor Cale." Holland shook his head. "But around Bax, if you put him in charge of a task, things just don't go wrong. If I set up a full moon meal, for sure at least one major meat or something wouldn't show up, and something else important would burn. It never happens with him."

"Maybe he's a lucky omega? Should I put him on a keychain?" Quin asked, and he must have done something because Holland twitched and slapped him before settling back into his spot under Quin's arm.

"I'd like to see you propose that to Abel," Holland said tartly, then sniffed and wordlessly dismissed the topic. "He does seem lucky, though, as long as he's involved. Not for himself, but for others. Which gives some credence to Montana Border's claims about Jason, even though Jason has never shown the same, uh, influence. Though he’s good at cooling hot tempers, too, now that I think about it.”

“You all are,” Quin said. “Even Bram, when he’s not getting himself worked up.”

Holland made a face and Quin chuckled.

Huh. That was interesting. Cas had never thought about it before, assuming it was just Bax being able to look ahead far enough and predict all the things that could go wrong, but it was true that if something important needed to happen, people tended to put Bax in charge. Including Quin.

As soon as that realization hit, Cas shot Quin a gimlet stare. "You greedy prick," he said with emphasis. "Keeping him for yourself. I could have used him last year during tax season."

"Unless you're going to teach him how to do our taxes, I don't think it would help."

"Okay, brotherly selfishness aside, what about the rest? Cale? Seoasamh? Wynn?"

Quin shook his head. "We don't know yet, but we're watching. We're wondering if they have to be mated before those talents come out."

"It doesn't say that in the journal."

"No, it doesn't," Holland said. "In fact, in the second, or maybe the third, it says the exact opposite. But the fact is, none of the unmated omegas are showing a talent. So what are we doing wrong, or doing differently, that mating changes?"