Pinocchio Antiquariato

IX. Spells for the Missus

March 5, 1888

Dear Ms. Engle,

I hope you are faring well.

Might I request you find me a verse again? Preferably a spell for putting restless souls to sleep. My lord has acquired a special guest who has trouble slumbering. The poor girl's been getting nightmares since she came here. I reckon it has to do with our insufferable lord.

It is too long a story to tell.

In exchange, here is a spell for warding off fairies who plan to steal your lady's babies. Prepare a horseshoe, or any material made of iron. While enchanting the metal, slowly wrap twine around it and dip into a bowl of water blessed by Kleena (make sure water is bathed in moonlight for three evenings). Say this incantation:

"Scorch the mischief maker,

No prick, wink, nor fumble,

No breath, sigh, or twinkle,

Nor fairy mother's finger,

Shall touch he who slumbers"

Do you know any equivalent spells that might work on vampires? I'd love to cast one on the lord, teach him a lesson.

Yours truly,

Mrs. Jen Ashfield.

... ... ...

The missus' head hurt. She feared a vein might pop anytime soon with how her blood boiled in sheer irritation.

She crossed her arms while inspecting the handiwork her oh, so industrious staff had done on the parlor's reconstruction. While Allen did splendid work on repairing walls where they should be, he did poor work choosing the wallpaper for covering the cracks. Jen had specifically mentioned they use the same chinoiserie over an ecru backdrop. Instead the blasted tosser chose a block printed piece of garbage that clashed terribly with the dark blue drapes. Froilan and Marcel had the misfortune of tearing off the tacky wall décor despite recovering from bad injuries.

And apart from the god-awful work on the walls, the furniture was in disarray. Some of the gilded chairs were missing a leg or two, footstools were upturned, some throw pillows were stained with demon blood, and the lord's china were all gathered together in a random corner like some street vendor's wares on display. The main door had large scratches on the wood, and the missus had to slap a hand to her face in exasperation because, Kleena forbid her, she was going to strangle the footman who lacked the common sense to replace the door with a new one. Jen had all the maids, from in-house and kitchen to casual, drop their duties and rework the parlor.

Any other day Jen would have felt guilty pulling them out while they recovered, but a half-arsed work was half-arsed work. If they were to keep the lord's reputation amongst mortals intact, the best way to do it was to maintain order and aesthetic within the Faelore mansion.

It took many hours before the parlor appeared the way it was before: gilded, elaborate, and absolutely splendid. She had Rodrick Atkey replace the old chandelier with a new one: an eccentric piece made of unicorn horns, golden thorns and rose-shaped crystals (where the lord acquired that many horns, Jen did not want to know). The hearth (which the house barely used) was all clean, and the carpets looked fluffy and smelled like freshly washed fabric. They pulled out old antiques from the basement to replace the ones that broke, most of them otherworldly pieces of ornamentation that would put the nobles' Egyptian knick-knacks to shame.