The house was sold out months in advance. Scalpers asked for four figures. Critics sat in the first rows with notebooks already poisoned. Tonight the new Salome would either resurrect the company or bury it forever.
Backstage smelled of terror and adrenaline: rosin, sweat, hairspray, the metallic tang of fear. Dancers ghosted through corridors painted black to hide the blood from broken toes. No one spoke above a whisper. Superstition clung to the walls like dust.
Elena stood in front of her dressing-room mirror, alone. The costume was little more than gold body paint and chains that draped across her breasts and hips, leaving back, sides, and most of her ass bare. Her skin shimmered under the lights, every muscle carved sharp from weeks of starvation and obsession. She looked like a bla
