Dark Hand: The Ballet Pact That Stole a Lifetime
Subtitle
A haunting fairy tale of ambition, bargains, and the price of brilliance — told through music, dust, and whispered promises.
Tagline
When every perfect step costs a minute of life, which dance will you choose?
By M Muzamil Shami - December 4, 2025
Summary
When applause tastes like ash and every pirouette steals time, Fissi trades seconds of her life for luminous fame. From gutter to gilded stage, she learns the hardest lesson of all: brilliance bought with a dark bargain doesn’t belong to the body that wore it. This classic-style fairy tale blends sensory ballet imagery, whispered bargains, and moral reckoning to ask — what would you give to be adored? A 700+ word narrative with memorable dialogue, emotional stakes, and a twist that reclaims hope.
Introduction
There is a sound that comes before the first step on stage — the hush of a crowd, the breath caught in a thousand chest cavities. To Fissi, it was the sound of a life she didn't have. When a shadowed hand promises applause in exchange for time, the curtain rises on a story where glory and mortality dance dangerously close.
Character Profiles
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Fissi (Felicia) — A poor maid with nimble feet and a ruinous longing for fame. Ambitious, insecure, gullible at her weakest hour.
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Nina — The kind-hearted original star, generous and gentle; she dies mysteriously after burning all her days for art.
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Camille — Spoiled heiress; arrogant but ultimately humanized by loss and redemption.
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Anna (the Teacher/Witch’s foil) — Secret savior, former star, mentor with a hidden past.
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The Dark Hand — A sinister, unseen force that performs miracles in exchange for lifespan; whispers, touch, and shadow control.
Setting Description
A Victorian-style city with gaslit streets, a creaky royal ballet academy smelling of rosin and dust, velvet curtains, and backstage corridors where moth-eaten costumes and whispered deals live. The contrast of opulence and squalor is carved into every alley and rehearsal room.
Story
The theatre smelled of lemon polish and old dreams. Fissi’s shoes scuffed on the backstage boards — thin wood that remembered a thousand falls. She pressed her face to the velvet curtain; the stage lights licked her shadow long and cruel.
“Nina looks pale tonight,” whispered a fellow dancer. The word pale traveled across the wings like rumor. Fissi’s fingers tingled. She had watched Nina from the cheap seats, how light seemed to follow her like a halo.
“Don’t fret,” Camille said, tailing a laugh. “She’s always dramatic. It’ll pass.”
After the final bow, the applause broke like a tide. Fissi lingered as cleaners hauled away bouquets. In the gloom a shop sign blinked: Miracles & Minor Repairs — Open After Dark. A hand — not a person, a shadow — slid beneath the eaves.
Fissi blinked. “Who’s there?” Her voice was a mouse.
A whisper thinned the air, like silk tearing. “I can make you shine.”
From a darkened counter an emaciated, glove-shaped thing extended — a palm of midnight with veins like strings. “What will you give?” it hissed.
“My fortune,” Fissi blurted. “Everything.” Her knees wanted applause more than food. The glove laughed — a rustle of leaves.
“No. I want more valuable things. Time.”
“Time?” She scoffed. “How much?”
“Ten years. A year. A minute.” The voice tasted like pennies and smoke.
“Just… ten minutes.” Fissi thought of a minute as nothing; a breath between steps.
The hand touched her wrist. She felt a cool slide, as if someone had slid a film over her senses. Suddenly she saw the stage in splinters of light; she heard the audience like bees. She danced that night without memory of the moves, as if someone else had sewn her limbs together. When her feet came to rest, the applause felt like a coin in her palm.
“Thank you,” she whispered to the air that had been her savior.
Weeks became a ribbon of applause. Her name curled across posters. The hand lived beneath the ribcage, like a second pulse: give a dance, lose a minute. Fissi paid easily at first — a shrug, a sale of seconds she would never count.
“You look different,” Nina said once, from a hospital bed. Her skin had the whiteness of not-quite-bloomed lilies.
Fissi knelt. “You’re my guide. Your steps taught me.”
Nina smiled weakly. “Don’t spend all your days on light. There’s a rhythm below applause.”
Fissi laughed and meant to be kind, but the city beneath her shoes had not changed. She walked past the alley where she used to eat stale bread and spat at the memory. Arrogance gilded her.
The hand whispered in the dark: More. More. More.
At the academy, a cruel edict fell: one student eliminated each day. The top three would remain. Fissi’s heart thudded at the thought of loss. When the hand made her dance, the audience wept. She rose — a comet of tenderness — and the judges leaned forward as if to inhale beauty.
“You used a trick!” Camille screamed in the wings when Fissi’s finale extinguished the oiled star who had previously owned the room. “That was impossible!”
Fissi didn’t answer. Her limbs hummed with stolen time.
It took less than a season for her minutes to become a debt collector. Suddenly the future was a ledger with holes. She rushed to the dark shop — to the back room where the owner sat like a clock without hands.
“Please,” Fissi begged, “save me. I’m not ready to—”
The owner’s face was the scarred relief of an old ballet poster. “I was once a dancer,” she snarled. “I made one bargain and watched my life thin.” Her voice curdled. “I created the hand to punish those who’d cheat destiny.”
“Then help me,” Fissi cried.
The witch only shrugged. “No. You must choose: burn bright and vanish, or learn to dance without my shadow.”
Fissi remembered Nina’s palms on hers — the gentleness — and the feel of a child’s fingers when she handed away a coin. She thought of the minutes she had sold, of birthday candles that would never be lit.
On the competition’s final night, Fissi stepped into the light. Her body trembled, but this time she remembered each breath, each rehearsal, each child she wanted to feed. She danced with her feet, not the hand’s.
When the final measure fell silent, something extraordinary happened. The hand shrieked — not loud, but like a violin string snapping — and dissolved. The audience rose slower than a tide, then roared. Fissi felt life return like warmth in her chest.
“You danced with your heart,” Anna whispered, holding her hand. “That’s the real miracle.”
Outside, the sky had the clear, honest color of morning. Fissi would spend years teaching poor kids to move like swans. She kept a scar on her wrist — pale as old parchment — and every night she lit a candle for Nina.
“You get to live,” she told the flame. “And dance.”
The hand’s echo remained in the theater’s shadows, a warning in every curtain twitch: some bargains promise the world, but only give away the days.
Moral of the Story
True brilliance is earned, not borrowed. The price of shortcuts can be the life itself you want to illuminate.
Significant Quotes
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“Every perfect step costs a minute of life.”
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“Dance with your feet, not with a borrowed shadow.”
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“Applause is currency — spend it wisely.”
FAQs
Q: Is the Dark Hand literal or symbolic?
A: Both — it’s a literal entity in the story and a symbol of shortcuts and corrupt bargains.
Q: Is this inspired by real ballet traditions?
A: The ballet setting borrows sensory detail from classical ballet culture but is fictional and allegorical.
Q: Can the curse be undone?
A: In this tale, yes — by authentic, self-earned effort. Your ending may differ.
Author Bio
M Muzamil Shami — Storyteller & blogger at Fairy Tales in English. I write modern fables that mix classical imagery with moral questions and practical SEO-savvy publishing tips.
Call to Action
Which minute would you trade for fame? Reply below with the hourglass emoji and your answer — best replies get featured in my next post.
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