The Whispering Night (Luminaries #3)

Chapter 31

CHAPTER 31

Interview with Wednesday (Winnie) Winona Wednesday

[0:00]

Jeremiah: [seated at interrogation table with open manila folder before him] Interview begins now at 6:45 A.M. on Tuesday, April twenty-third. Ms. Wednesday, eyewitness accounts place you in the second-floor east gallery when the hotspot formed at [glances at notes] 11:16 P.M. on Monday, April twenty-second. Is that correct?

Winnie: [stares at hands folded on table; expression is vacant] I don’t know. Probably.

Jeremiah: We also have three reports of… Open quote. A golden arrow flying across the room. Close quote. And one person said, open quote. It looked like magic. Close quote. All four reports mark you as the source of the magic.

Winnie: Okay. I wasn’t, but okay.

Jeremiah: Care to elaborate?

Winnie: Not really.

[Jeremiah takes a sip from a nearby coffee mug. Then leans back in his chair.]

[1:03]

Jeremiah: Ms. Wednesday, you’re in a lot of trouble. As I’m sure you know because we’ve done this before. [waves hand at interrogation room] Except last time, it wasn’t you standing accused of magic and witchcraft. It was your father—

Winnie: And you know damned well my dad was framed. That it was really the banshees who have vertical pupils, greenish skin, and claws with needle-like points.

[Jeremiah frowns. Then taps at the folder on the table.]

[1:25]

Jeremiah: I’m not sure I follow.

Winnie: [tilts forward now, visibly angry] Bull shit, Jeremiah. I know what you are and what you know. The basilisks possess hollow fangs that inject venom much like natural snakes. FUCK.

Jeremiah: Calm down, Ms. Wednesday—

Winnie: You calm down! I didn’t ask to be here. I, like everyone else, was trapped inside a fucking hotspot while nightmares tried to kill me. But now, somehow, it’s all my fault.

Jeremiah: It’s not?

Winnie: You know it’s not, just like you know I’m not a Diana. And you know my dad was never a Diana either. We’re all innocent and the examination reveals algal hair and a bulbous body— no. [She breaks off with a sob. Then crumples forward to land on her hands on the table.]

[2:06]

Jeremiah: Here’s what I know, Ms. Wednesday—

Winnie: [muffled] Call me Winnie. My name is Winnie.

Jeremiah: We found this phone in the gallery. It appears to be yours, and you have a message to Jay Friday telling him to meet you there, as well as an unsent message to Erica Thursday.

Winnie: [lifts head and audibly swallows] Have you… seen Jay?

Jeremiah: No, Ms. Wednesday. But if you’re worried about his secret, well… cat’s out of the bag. Or should I say wolf?

[Winnie sways.]

Jeremiah: And as for Ms. Thursday, she was questioned at the museum—and she was a great deal more forthcoming about last night.

[Winnie doesn’t answer. Just crumples over again.]

Jeremiah: Ms. Wednesday—

Winnie: Winnie.

Jeremiah:—I need you to sit up. You’re going to want to see these.

[He pulls four red envelopes from the manila folder. Then opens the envelopes and withdraws white cards.]

[2:50]

Jeremiah: These are birthday cards, aren’t they? Signed as if from your father. Are they from your father?

[Winnie snaps upright. Then catches self on table. Jeremiah, meanwhile, lays out four cards side by side.]

[3:08]

Jeremiah: Let the record show I have placed four cards for Ms. Wednesday to view, and the cards all contain birthday messages. Two are for Darian Wednesday, two are for Winnie Wednesday.

Winnie: [voice shaking] My dad is gone. How could he send me birthday cards?

Jeremiah: I’m wondering the same, Ms. Wednesday. I’m also wondering what these mean. To what framed photo is your dad referring in this card? And why write the birthday year so strangely? Happy one dash three dash T H birthday?

Winnie: You’ll have to ask my dad what it means because… well, it’s all one big cipher to me. [She slouches back in her chair and gazes left.]

[3:47]

Jeremiah: Come now, Ms. Wednesday. These were in your pocket at the museum. Why have birthday cards that are meaningless?

Winnie: Because… [She swallows.] The… well, a person gave them to me.

Jeremiah: And you took them from this [makes air quotes] person? Willingly?

Winnie: I mean, they offered the cards to me, and yeah. I… didn’t know what was going on, okay? I went to that gallery because I was… I was following some messages. [sighs, possibly with relief] And the messages led me to the gallery, where a person met me who had these cards.

Jeremiah: And that person cast the sagitte aurea spell?

Winnie: No. They protected me from it. They wore a hound mask. [Her eyebrows lift, as if surprised.]

Jeremiah: A hound mask? Because it was a costume party?

Winnie: Don’t pretend you don’t know what a hound mask means.

Jeremiah: In other words, you know what a hound mask means.

[He smiles and withdraws a photograph from the folder.]

[4:32]

Just like these hound masks from two bodies in the forest.

[Winnie coughs. Then pulls off her glasses and sets them on the table.]

[4:47]

Jeremiah: Let the record show the photograph is of two corpses in the forest, their bodies burned beyond recognition. They each wear a mostly melted hound mask like Diana canés wear. Now, Ms. Wednesday, I am going to guess by your reaction that you know who these Dianas are. That, in fact, you were with them when they died.

[Winnie shakes her head.]

Jeremiah: You can protest all you want, but I know you were there [taps photograph] because of… oh, where is it. [He searches the folder while still speaking.] You see, we found signs of a changeling on the morning we found the dead bodies. But the changeling itself was missing. Until the following night, when the Thursday hunters found it and killed it. [He slides a second photograph onto the table.]

[Winnie gags. Then turns away.]

[5:25]

Jeremiah: Let the record show this is a photograph of a dead young woman who looks exactly like Winnie Wednesday, except for the telltale claws that indicate it’s actually a changeling. So what happened that night, Ms. Wednesday? Did you kill your fellow Dianas, and then decide to attack the old museum too?

Winnie: [voice weak] I didn’t attack the old museum. You know I didn’t.

Jeremiah: I don’t know anything, actually, because whenever I press you for answers, you fill the air with trivia. Which is—I can only assume—a tactic your mother taught you. But you know what, Ms. Wednesday? I have time. I have lots and lots of time.

[Jeremiah picks up his coffee mug and sits back in his chair. He takes several sips, watching Winnie. She sits slumped in her own chair.]

[7:20]

Jeremiah: I have witnesses too, Ms. Wednesday, of you and your friend Jay Friday. So if I want, I can lock you up forever—and have him killed as soon as we find him.

[Winnie sighs. Then rests her forehead on the table.]

Jeremiah: I won’t do that yet though. Instead, I’ll wait. Because there’s obviously a network of Dianas here in Hemlock Falls, and I intend to find out who they are. Each and every one of them. Let the record show I am now withdrawing a book from the folder. Do you know what this is, Ms. Wednesday?

[Winnie looks up as Jeremiah places a paperback book on the table.]

[7:56]

Jeremiah: This is called Shooting Stars: Identifying Asteroids, Comets, and Meteors. Do you recognize it?

Winnie: [sighs again] Yeah. It was in Professor Samuel’s office.

Jeremiah: So you know what he was.

Winnie: I do, although not for the reason you’re implying. And you know this already. Just as I know you went to Samuel’s office to destroy evidence.

Jeremiah: I’m sorry, to do what now?

Winnie: Why else would you go there?

Jeremiah: Because it took us almost a full week to ID his body, and we were hoping to find evidence of other Dianas. This is all we found though. Now tell me: What’s important about this page? For the recording, I am opening to page 273, where the spine is split and worn. It’s a page dedicated to the Lyrids, a meteor shower that happens each April.

[Winnie swallows and stares at the book.]

[8:33]

Jeremiah: Well, Ms. Wednesday?

Winnie: I don’t know. It’s April now, Jeremiah, so I guess the professor was enjoying the meteors.

[Jeremiah frowns.]

Jeremiah: So these constellations, Lyra and Hercules, mean nothing to you?

Winnie: Obviously not. I didn’t even know they were constellations until right now.

Jeremiah: Sure you didn’t.

[He glances at his watch. Then closes the book and returns it to the folder.]

[9:18]

Jeremiah: If you want to play coy, Ms. Wednesday, then that’s fine. I’m not going to torture you for answers. I’ll give you time to think over everything we’ve covered, and when I come back tonight, I expect you’ll have more to say. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have an All-Terrain 10K to win. In the name of scorpion pride, “we hold the line.”

[Jeremiah returns the photographs and birthday cards to the folder before him. He stacks it all neatly, then pushes to his feet.]

[9:49]

Jeremiah: Interview concluded at 6:55—

Winnie: [voice muffled by table] I’m the Midnight Crown. [She lifts her head.] People will wonder where I am.

Jeremiah: No, Ms. Wednesday. I really don’t think they will.

[End 10:00]