A hush fell over the alley as Jackelin stood over her victim, her breath slow and steady. She lingered, observing the stillness of death, but her work was far from done. With a deft motion, she drew a slender blade from beneath her cloak–a blade meant not for flesh but for soul. Her fingers traced ethereal symbols in the air, summoning the spectral residue that clung to the corpse like the very fog that wrapped the streets.


    The ritual began. Her voice was a murmur, each word resonant with intent as she coaxed the soul from his body, her gestures precise, her will unyielding. Slowly, the soul emerged, a ghostly figure hanging in the fog, his translucent form trembling with the dim awareness of its fate. Jackelin’s eyes held no pity; instead, they reflected only control. The soul’s form flickered, his gaze empty and pleading, but Jackelin felt nothing. Not anymore.


    Behind her, Jack wrestled with his own ritual, crude and chaotic, binding his phantoms, a female, with brute force. His souls were always shattered, tormented, their bindings volatile. He twisted them to his will, breaking them into submission. Jackelin’s lips curled into a cold smirk–there was no finesse in his ritual, no understanding. His phantoms were little more than half-dead things, unlike her own, which bent to her will with obedient whispers.If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    Each soul she bound was a testament to her mastery, a reflection of the discipline she forged from a life of scorn and hatred. She whispered to the phantom before her, her tone as commanding as it was cold, allowing no room for resistance. The spectral form shivered, his last fragment of free will dissolving as he submitted to her will.


    In the recesses of her mind, she could hear faint echoes of the life she once envisioned. She and Jack wanted to be clerics, guiding souls to peace, embodying holiness. But the world cast them into the shadows, condemned them to the filth of forgotten lives. Now, rather than guiding souls to peace, she bound them, shackling them to her will. Each phantom was a rebellion, a twisted mockery of the piety she had once craved.


    This was her path now: a twisted version of what the clerics did, not releasing souls but ensnaring them. Every soul bound to her was another scar upon her soul, a strike against the purity she’d once sought. But she felt no regret–only power coiling around her like a second skin, sharp and consuming.


    When her ritual was done, she rose, gaze lingering on the shimmering phantom hovering beside her, his form flickering like a wraith. She felt his resentment, his faint resistance, but she cared little for his sorrow. This was her world now. The fog embraced her, and, as she moved forward, her phantom trailed in silence, a reflection of the darkness that had claimed her.