Wards “ward off” things. In this case, they will keep unwanted entities outside of an area that you have warded.
In Miriam-Webster’s online dictionary:
See the 1st, 3rd and 4th post down in this thread:
Assumed to be so basic no one talks about it until beginners get a problem and wonder why, and six people say “cleanse and banish, set up wards, take care of your spiritual hygiene”. This megathread collects our favourite cleaning, banishing and self protection preventative techniques. Some are fix and forget/maintain occasionally, like wards, some are for on the spot emergency use. My top book recommendation for this work has to be Robert Bruce’s The Practical Psychic Self-Defense Handbook: …