As soon as the "Beltane" episode of Freeform's new drama Motherland: Fort Salem comes up in our discussion, Ashley Nicole Williams exclaims, "That's where it gets a little loud, a little crazy." And she's not wrong.

In the series, Ashley plays Abigail Bellweather, a driven, ambitious young witch from a long line of heroic witches; she, along with fellow lead characters Raelle Collar (Taylor Hickson) and Tally Craven (Jessica Sutton), are in training to use their magic to serve the United States military. The first three episodes follow the three young women as they learn how to wield their powers and deal with each other, even as rogue witch terrorist group The Spree continues their rampage around the world.

But the episode that aired on April 8, "Hail Beltane," is a big shift in how the show operates. For one, it brings in a rare commodity in the world of Fort Salem: Men. And no one is taking more advantage of that import than Abigail, who goes full throttle into the orgiastic ritual and comes out on top.

Ashley, who started acting when she was five, says that as a kid she wrote an imaginary autobiography where she was a movie star; she went on to take classes with Texas acting coach Cathryn Sullivan, who is known for working with stars such as Selena Gomez and Demi Lovato. And like her Motherland character Abigail, she's pretty good at manifesting her goals thus far.

In an interview with Teen Vogue, Ashley talked about the show's message of female leadership, the somewhat "freaky" singing they perform as their magic, and what it was like to film Abigail's big Beltane threesome scene.

Teen Vogue: One of the most interesting aspects of the show for me is that everything that you would normally see happen between men onscreen happens between women, whether it's talking about strategy or training or telling war stories. Does that feel satisfying to act out and watch?

Ashley Nicole Williams: Oh yes, for sure. I keep coming back to the female empowerment. If you see our billboard advertisement, we're literally screaming at you, and you can't shut us up. In the show, we use our voices as our power. We sing these storms, we have different seed sounds that we sing to activate different different defenses. We break a lot of different stigmas with the role reversals, and it's unlike any other show, that really drew me to the script.

TV: Abigail, Raelle, and Tally seem to have an evolving dynamic — how does their relationship change as they get closer?

ANW: The first episode, you have two insanely alpha alphas, Abigail and Raelle, just going at it with each other and you have Tally trying to keep them together. They're just butting heads, and each of us want Tally on our side. I think the beautiful thing is you'll see all three of the girls go through their own things, but they go through them together. They learn they can trust each other.

TV: Let's get into that Beltane episode. Your character wraps these men around her finger. She's having a threesome with two guys, she's controlling what happens. What was it like getting to play that aspect of Abigail?

ANW: Oh my gosh, it was so empowering. In movies you hear guys talk like, "Oh yeah, two girls kissing is just so hot, man." You never see it the other way around. The fact that my character is just so empowered herself to have the authority to be like, "OK, stop. Now you two go at it." And then she's like, "Uh-uh, back to me." That was so insane to play because I've never done that. I hope it empowers women when they see that. Like, ooh, I can, I can do these things too? I don't have to be ashamed of what society sees as good sexual things for women?

TV: Sometimes watching the scenes where everyone is singing, it's so cool, but it's also a little disturbing.