The world within the stone walls of "Lavanda" was a world unto itself, a sanctuary built not on silence, but on scent. The air was thick with it—a calming, clarifying fog of lavender. It seeped from the woven sachets hanging in bunches from the dark, wooden beams, from the cakes of olive-oil soap stacked in neat pyramids, from the delicate bottles of essential oil that gleamed like amber jewels in the light from the leaded glass window. It was a smell that promised peace, a fragrant bulwark against the frantic energy of the outside world.
And outside, Korčula's old town was frantic. The summer season was flexing its muscles. Tourists, a river of sunburned flesh, straw hats, and clicking cameras, flowed through the narrow, marble-paved streets. Their voices rose in a cacophonous blend of languages, a stark contrast to the quiet, ancient stones of the Venetian-style palaces. The clatter of dishes from café terraces, the call of a gelato vendor, the tinny strains of a folk song from a shop selling souvenirs—it was a symphony of commerce and curiosity that pressed in on all sides.
Ina, standing behind the worn, beautiful counter of her shop, felt the pressure of it like a physical weight. After the strange, unsettling events in the field yesterday, the noise felt more invasive than usual. Her nerves were still frayed, the memory of that deep, earth-born hum and the feeling of being watched lingering like a ghost in the back of her mind. She'd slept fitfully, her dreams filled with shifting soil and the impossibly vibrant crimson of the poppies by the well.
Today, she'd thrown herself into work, using the familiar rituals of her trade as an anchor. She'd restocked the shelves, polished the glass of the display cases until it shone, and meticulously updated her ledger. The shop was bustling, a steady stream of customers providing a welcome distraction. She moved among them with a practiced, quiet efficiency, her shyness a veil she knew how to wear in public. She answered questions about the properties of the oil, helped a young couple choose a wedding sachet, and rang up sales with a soft, genuine smile that never quite reached the still-troubled depths of her eyes.
She was wrapping a delicate, lavender-filled dream pillow for an elderly English woman when the bell above the door chimed again. The current of air that entered with the new customer was different. It didn't bring with it the smells of sun cream and hot pavement. It carried the scent of the forest after rain, of rich, damp earth, of something wild and vital and profoundly clean.
Ina finished tying the twine around the linen pouch, her fingers moving automatically. "There you are," she said, her voice soft. "Sleep well."
As the woman thanked her and moved away, Ina finally looked up.
And the world stopped.
The man standing just inside the doorway seemed to have drawn all the sound from the room. The chatter of the other tourists faded into a distant, muffled hum. The light from the window, which a moment before had been illuminating dust motes dancing in the air, now seemed to coalesce around him, as if he were a lens focusing the very sun.
He was… impossible.
He was tall, with a build that spoke of raw, natural power rather than gym-honed vanity. His shoulders were broad, filling the space in a way that made the small shop feel suddenly intimate. He wore simple, modern clothes—dark trousers and a white linen shirt—but they hung on him with an odd, anachronistic grace, as if he were a statue from a forgotten temple temporarily draped in contemporary fabric.
His hair was a thick, unruly mane of black, the color of volcanic soil, of a moonless night over the Adriatic. It was touched with threads of silver at the temples that did not speak of age, but of antiquity, like frost on ancient stone. But it was his face that held her utterly captive. It was a face carved not by human hands, but by wind and water and time itself. Strong, masculine lines, a jaw that could have been cut from the karst limestone of the Velebit mountain, a mouth that was both stern and sensuous.
And his eyes.
They were the color of the most fertile earth on the slopes of her field, a deep, rich, dark brown that seemed to hold within it the potential for all life. They were not merely eyes; they were landscapes. As he looked at her, she felt a sensation so visceral it was like a physical blow to her chest. It was the same feeling she'd had in the field yesterday—the hum, the shimmer, the intense, curious presence—but now it was concentrated, personified, and looking directly at her.
He moved further into the shop, and his movements were not the shuffling, browsing gait of a tourist. He moved with a predator's quiet grace, a slow, deliberate prowl that was both unsettling and mesmerizing. He didn't look at the soaps or the oils or the hanging bundles of lavender. His gaze, those deep soil-colored eyes, was fixed solely on her.
Ina felt her breath catch in her throat. Her heart, which had been beating a steady, if slightly anxious, rhythm, now began to hammer against her ribs like a trapped bird. A flush warmed her neck and crept into her cheeks. She, who was so accustomed to being in the background, to being the quiet keeper of the shop, was now the absolute center of a universe contained in this man's gaze. She felt seen, in a way she had never been seen before. It was as if he were looking past her skin, past her bones, and directly into the quiet, sometimes fearful, but always passionate heart of her.
He stopped before the counter, and the scent of him washed over her—clean, male sweat, sun-warmed skin, and that undeniable, intoxicating aroma of pure, living earth. It was the scent from her field, the one that had clung to the lavender she'd cut after the disturbance. It was him. It had been him.
For a long moment, he simply looked at her. His eyes traveled over her face with the same slow, appreciative thoroughness with which she might examine a newly bloomed flower. He took in her light brown curls, her freckles, the line of her throat, the slight part of her lips. There was no leer in his gaze, no casual appraisal. It was a study. A consumption. A god cataloging a newfound wonder.
Ina found she couldn't look away. She was pinned, mesmerized. The noise of the shop, the other customers, it all melted into an indistinct blur. There was only him, and the terrifying, thrilling intensity of his presence.
"Can I… help you?" she managed, her voice a breathy, unfamiliar thing.
A slow, small smile touched his lips. It was a smile that knew its own power, a smile that seemed to suggest he found her attempt at normalcy both charming and entirely unnecessary.
"I would like," he said, and his voice was a low, resonant baritone that vibrated through the wooden counter and into her very bones. It was the sound of stones grinding deep underground, of roots pushing through soil. It was the hum from the field, given words. "To buy some lavender."
He spoke Croatian, but his accent was strange, archaic, as if he'd learned the language from inscriptions on ancient stones.
Ina's mind went blank. Lavender. He wanted lavender. She sold lavender. This was a transaction. A normal, everyday transaction. She could do this. She clutched at the thought like a lifeline.
"Of course," she said, her voice a little stronger. She gestured weakly to a large copper urn filled with fresh, fragrant bundles to her right. "These are from this week's harvest. From my field just outside town."
His gaze followed her gesture, but only for a second before returning to her face. "Your field," he repeated, and the words were a caress, a statement of deep, personal knowledge. He didn't ask where it was; he said it as if he knew its every contour, the feel of its soil, the pattern of its shadows.
He reached out, his hand moving toward the bundles. His hands were large, the fingers long and strong, the backs dusted with dark hair. They were the hands of a laborer, a creator, a king. They were hands that could wield a hammer or cradle a sparrow's egg with equal care.
As his fingers closed around a bundle of lavender, his knuckles brushed against the back of her hand where it rested on the counter.
The jolt was instantaneous and electric.
It was not a static shock. It was a surge of pure, unadulterated life. A current of warmth and energy shot up her arm, flooding her chest, curling deep in her belly. It was the feeling of the first warm day of spring after a long winter, of seeing a field of flowers bloom all at once, of the fierce, joyful leap of her heart when she was truly, passionately happy. It was a feeling so potent, so fundamentally good, that it bordered on pain.
She gasped, a sharp, involuntary intake of breath, and snatched her hand back as if burned. Her eyes, wide and startled, flew to his.
He didn't apologize. He didn't seem surprised. He simply held her gaze, his dark eyes gleaming with a knowing, ancient light. He had felt it too. Of that, she was absolutely certain. The touch had been a bridge, and something immense and powerful had crossed it.
He brought the lavender to his face and inhaled deeply, his eyes closing for a moment. The sight was intensely intimate. "It smells of the sun," he murmured, his voice a low rumble. "And of your hands."
The statement was so personal, so presumptuous, it should have made her angry. Instead, it made her feel weak. He paid for the bundle with a few kuna coins he pulled from his pocket, his movements slightly awkward, as if the act of handling human currency was unfamiliar to him.
He didn't leave immediately. He stood there, holding the lavender, looking at her as if waiting for something. The space between them crackled with unspoken energy.
"I am Juraj," he said finally, the name sounding like an old, powerful word, a secret spoken aloud.
"Ina," she whispered, her own name feeling fragile on her lips.
"Ina," he repeated, and he tasted the word, savored it. A true, full smile broke across his face then, and it transformed him. It was the smile of the sun breaking through storm clouds, brilliant and life-giving. It was a smile of pure, unadulterated pleasure. "It suits you."
And with that, he turned and walked out of the shop, the bell chiming softly behind him. The scent of earth and forest lingered in his wake, mingling with the lavender.
The spell was broken. The sounds of the shop rushed back in—the chatter, the clinking of the doorbell, the footsteps on marble. A customer approached the counter with a question, but Ina couldn't hear them. She was staring at the space where he had stood, her hand still tingling from his touch, her body humming with the echo of that incredible jolt.
She looked down at her hand, half-expecting to see a physical mark. There was nothing. But she felt branded. Soothed and scorched all at once.
The man, Juraj, was gone. But his presence remained, saturating the air, settling deep into her bones. The strange event in the field was no longer an isolated, frightening mystery. It had a face. It had a name. And it had looked at her with an intensity that promised her quiet, orderly life was over.
She was terrified. And, a treacherous, long-dormant part of her soul whispered, she was more alive than she had ever been. The god of spring had walked into her shop, had bought a piece of her sanctuary, and with a single, accidental touch, had sown a seed of wild, impossible passion deep within her.