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Dark Arts
The Tongue-Tying Rite
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For talk: the colleague briefing against you, the relative who repeats what they are told, the ex who will not stop narrating your life to people. A strip of red cloth for the tongue, their name folded inside it, nine knots and the freezer. Aimed at the telling rather than at the person, which is both the ethics and the reason it has an end.
What You Will Need
A strip of red cloth, about a hand long
Cut from anything red you already own. It stands for the tongue, and this is the folk substitute for the cow's tongue the old versions used - no less effective and considerably easier to live with.
Their name and the exact words, written
On a slip: their name, and underneath it the specific thing being said about you, in their words as closely as you can manage. The specificity is the whole working. “Says I was sacked.” Not “is horrible about me”.
Black thread
A length long enough for nine knots with room between them. Black for binding and for silence.
A pin or a needle
To pierce the folded slip once before it goes in the cloth.
Coarse salt
A pinch inside the bundle. Not to harm - to keep. Salt is in here as a preservative, because this working is a holding rather than a hurting.
A black candle
Lit for the knotting and snuffed at the end. Snuffed, not blown: you are closing a mouth, so you close the flame the same way.
A bag and a freezer
A small freezer bag or a lidded tub. The bundle goes into the back of the freezer and stays there, which is the oldest surviving American folk form of a binding and the most practical one anybody has come up with.
Moon Phase & Timing
A working of stopping, made as the light leaves. There is no version of this for a waxing moon.
Waning Moon: The time for it. Something is being reduced, and the sky is doing the same.
Dark of the Moon: For talk that has been running for months and has already cost you something. The strongest night and the most serious.
Saturday: Saturn's day: limits, silence, and what is not permitted past. The traditional day for any binding.
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The Ritual
5 steps, with the words to speak at each one.
You have the materials and the timing. The ritual itself — every step, every incantation, and how to shape the spell to your own intention — lives inside the Grimoire, alongside over 200 spells.
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This spell is provided for spiritual and entertainment purposes. Midnight Spellcraft makes no guarantees of specific results. Trust your intuition and practice responsibly.