Ingrid shook her head. "No. They wanted to talk to Mother first. They had to use the room to interrogate someone else, so they moved me here. I have no idea what's happening."
"Some friend you got there," Freya muttered. She leaned back in her chair and looked around the small room with the one-way mirror. She wondered who was watching them. "Well, this brings back memories."
Her sister closed her eyes and bit the top of her thumb. "I know."
Freya sighed. In 1690 they had settled in the pretty little town of Salem in Massachusetts. Their lives had brought them to the New World as healers. Their mother had been one of the most sought-after midwives, had delivered healthy babies in a time when so many women died in childbirth and so many newborns died of fevers and pox. Ingrid worked in the community the same way she did now, doling out household charms and spells. Their father was a fisherman, due to his ability to maneuver the waters and bring in plentiful harvests.
Then something terrible happened. Bridget Bishop, who helped Joanna with the washing, came to her for help during her pregnancy and died in childbirth. Bridget was very dear to the family, and Joanna had not been able to help her. Then the rumors started: Freya was said to be conducting an affair with a boy who had pledged to marry Ann Putnam, who would become the ringleader of accusers. Ann and her friend Mercy Lewis testified that they had seen Freya and Ingrid "flying in the air through the winter mist." The trials were a farce, but effective. The community turned on them, branding Freya a slut, Ingrid a bitch, and Joanna a monster. Norman and Joanna had been spared but they were given a more terrible punishment. They had to watch as their daughters were hanged at Gallows Hill in 1692.
Freya shuddered. She could still remember the feeling of the noose around her neck, the scratchy rope that made her skin itch. The way the crowd had spat and thrown rotten food at their cart, the hatred and the fear and the hysteria.
"Don't," Ingrid said, as she knew exactly what Freya was thinking. "It doesn't help."
The Salem trials were the beginning of the end of practicing magic in mid-world. When the girls were reborn, they found a new world and new rules awaiting them. The family had resettled in North Hampton, and Joanna explained that the White Council had paid them a visit right after the burial. The Council told them that in order for any of them to continue to live in mid-world, every one of the Waelcyrgean would now have to adhere to a new condition: The Restriction of Magical Powers. In effect, it meant that they could no longer practice the art of magic and witchcraft without punishment and recrimination from the Council. They were to live as humans, with lives that were as ordinary as possible. There could be no more undue attention that would jeopardize knowledge of their existence. To continue to survive in mid-world they had to agree to live in the shadows. Those who did not comply would be in breach of Council laws and would be severely punished.
Their mother also told them that Norman had left the family for good, and they never saw their father again.
Back in Salem, as in North Hampton today, Freya understood that they would not be allowed to use their magic to save themselves. That had been made clear from the very beginning, when they found themselves stuck on the other side of the bridge, right in the dawn of the world. Sometimes Freya wondered how it was that she was so old and yet so young at the same time that she found herself in the same place as she had centuries before. Would she never learn? Maybe the Council was right, maybe magic had no place in mid-world. Every time they practiced it in the open, this happened: an anxious mob, a swift rush to judgment; and the result was always the same - witches hanging from the gallows, or burned at the stake, their ashes scattered to the four winds.
They sat in the room for what felt like an eternity but in reality was only a few hours. The policemen were kind and polite, especially those who had worked with Freya before, bringing deli sandwiches and drinks from the vending machine. But they were not allowed to leave. Matt Noble checked in on them from time to time, but Freya had been able to understand from his tight-lipped anxiety and Ingrid's mournful gazes that while he was not happy about what was happening, he had no power to stop it, either.
Finally, the door opened and their mother was allowed inside the room.
"What's going on?" Freya asked, helping Joanna to the nearest chair.
"It's the most absurd thing," Joanna said. She looked at her daughters, completely mystified by the situation in which they had found themselves. Here there were, afraid of the Council's recriminations, worrying about thunderbolts from the sky, and they had forgotten that the human realm was historically the area that had brought them the most pain.
"Okay, what is it? What did they want to talk to you about?"
Joanna looked at her girls with an expression of disbelief. "Maura Thatcher woke up from her coma."
"That's good, isn't it?" Ingrid asked.
"Well, yes. Except she told the detectives I was the one who attacked them the night that Bill died, that she saw me hit him on the back of the head with a rock. Then I did the same to her. Can you imagine? According to her, I killed him. "
Chapter thirty-eight
A Good Offense
Is a Good Defense
Before the girls could react, the door opened again. Matt Noble entered the room and addressed the three women grouped around the table. "I'm so sorry. It's quite late and we're going to have to continue this another day." He looked plaintively at Ingrid but she refused to acknowledge him.
"So we're free to go now?" Freya asked.
"Even me?" Joanna asked tentatively.
"Yes, even you, Mrs. Beauchamp." Matt nodded. "Again, I apologize for the inconvenience. We're hoping you can come back tomorrow and answer our questions then."
Freya nodded curtly. "Come on, Ingrid, Mother," she said, leading her sister and mother out of the room. Ingrid looked as if she had gone catatonic, and Joanna appeared exhausted beyond reason.
"We're not coming back tomorrow," Ingrid said, finding her voice and looking straight at the detective. "Not without our lawyer."
One good thing about lawyers, Ingrid thought, was that they were always punctual. Attorneys and their bills always arrived right on time. Antonio Forseti was a defense lawyer with a sterling reputation. He was also a warlock and an old friend of the family. Like the Beauchamps, he had been unable to practice magic since the restriction had been imposed on all of their kind. Instead he had used his natural talents at negotiating, striking balances, and using mediation to build one of the largest and most successful legal firms in New York City. He arrived the next afternoon armed with news.