The sun hung low over Puri like a ripe mango, casting golden ripples across Narendra Tank. It was the heart of Chandan Yatra, the 42-day odyssey of sandalwood and devotion that transformed the sleepy coastal town into a symphony of color and chant. For three weeks now, the deities—Lord Jagannath, his brother Balabhadra, sister Subhadra, and the mighty Sudarshan—had been ferried daily on ornate boats across the sacred waters. Servitors in vibrant silks smeared their wooden forms with cooling chandan paste, the air thick with the scent of sandalwood, jasmine, and the salty tang of the Bay of Bengal. Drums thrummed like heartbeats, conch shells wailed in ecstasy, and devotees danced on the ghats, their faces painted with the same sacred unguent that promised relief from the scorching Odisha summer.

Aruna moved through the throng like a shadow woven from the festival itself. At twenty-four, she was a daughter of Puri, her life entwined with the Jagannath Temple's rhythms. Her family had served as pahadars—temple guardians—for generations, and during Chandan Yatra, she assisted the daitas, the hereditary servitors, in preparing the massive earthen pots of sandalwood paste. Her hands, callused yet graceful, bore the faint white streaks of dried chandan, a mark of her quiet piety. Aruna loved the festival's chaos—the laughter of children chasing floating flower garlands, the elders' tales of divine mischief—but beneath it all, a loneliness gnawed at her. Suitors came and went, drawn by her almond eyes and the sway of her sari, but none saw the fire in her soul, the dreams she whispered to the sea at dawn.

That afternoon, as the boats returned from their procession, Aruna balanced a brass tray heaped with fresh chandan atop her head, weaving toward the makeshift pandal where the idols would rest. The crowd surged, a living tide of saris in crimson and saffron, dhotis crisp with starch. She glimpsed him then—Vikram, the outsider with a camera slung around his neck like a talisman. He was from Delhi, thirty and restless, chasing stories through his lens for a travel magazine. Puri was just another assignment, or so he'd told himself when he boarded the train two days ago. But the festival's pulse had already quickened something in him, a forgotten ache for roots he didn't know he craved.

Vikram knelt by the tank's edge, framing a shot of a servitor anointing Subhadra's boat with a conch of holy water. The light fractured on the water like shattered glass, and he clicked away, lost in the moment. Aruna didn't see the dip in the path until it was too late. Her foot caught on a loose stone, the tray tilted, and a cascade of creamy sandalwood paste spilled forth—straight onto Vikram's white kurta.

He jolted upright, the cool paste seeping into the fabric, marking him like a unintended devotee. Laughter bubbled from the crowd, but Aruna's cheeks burned hotter than the sun. "Mahaprabhu ki jai!" she gasped, dropping to her knees to scoop the mess back into the tray. Her dupatta slipped, revealing the curve of her shoulder, dusted with the same fragrant paste.

Vikram blinked, then grinned, his dark eyes crinkling at the corners. "Jai Jagannath," he replied softly, his Hindi laced with a city polish that made her heart stutter. He didn't scold or flee; instead, he crouched beside her, his fingers brushing hers as they gathered the spilled chandan. The touch was electric, a spark amid the humid air. "Looks like the gods have chosen me for their art today."

Aruna glanced up, her laughter tentative, like monsoon rain testing the earth. "You're not from here. The paste is for the deities, not wanderers with cameras."

"Wanderer? Guilty." He wiped a smear from his cheek, leaving a white streak like war paint. "But maybe it's a sign. I'm Vikram. And you?"

"Aruna." She rose, steadying the tray, but her eyes lingered on the way the chandan clung to his skin, turning his ordinary face into something divine. "Come, before the servitors see. I'll help clean it."

She led him to a quiet corner behind the pandal, where palms whispered secrets to the breeze. There, by a clay urn of water, she dipped a cloth and dabbed at his kurta. Up close, he smelled of sandalwood now, mingled with the faint musk of travel—sweat and ambition. Vikram watched her, the camera forgotten around his neck. "This festival... it's alive. Not like the ones in the city, all noise and no soul. How do you bear it every year? The heat, the crowds?"

Aruna paused, the cloth hovering. "Bear it? It's my breath. Chandan cools the gods from summer's fire, reminds us that even the divine needs tenderness." Her voice softened. "And in the cooling, we find our own peace. What about you? Chasing pictures, but do you ever stop to feel?"

He leaned against the palm trunk, his gaze tracing the line of her jaw. "I stopped today. Because of you."

The words hung between them, fragile as a lotus petal. That evening, as the sun bled orange into the sea, Vikram found her again amid the aarti by the tank. Thousands gathered, lamps flickering like fireflies, priests chanting verses from the Gitagovinda. Aruna stood at the water's edge, her sari pooling like ink, offering a garland to the waves. Vikram slipped beside her, his kurta still faintly scented, and together they watched the boats glide out one last time for the day, their prows crowned with peacock feathers.

"Tell me a story," he murmured, as the conches blew. "About this yatra."

Aruna smiled, her eyes reflecting the lamps. "Long ago, the gods grew weary of the temple's stone embrace. So every summer, they escape to the water, smeared in chandan to hide from the heat demon. But it's more—a lover's game. Jagannath woos the world through these rituals, his heart open like the tank's waters."

Vikram's hand found hers in the shadows, fingers interlacing like vines. "And what if a wanderer woos a guardian? Is that part of the tale?"

Her pulse raced, a drumbeat matching the distant tabors. She turned to him, the festival's glow etching his features in amber. "Perhaps. If the gods allow."

Nights blurred into days. Vikram's camera captured not just the grandeur—the serpentine queues of devotees, the daitas' rhythmic chants as they applied paste in intricate patterns—but stolen moments with Aruna. They shared puffed rice under banyan trees, her teaching him Odia folk songs while he sketched her portrait in the sand. One dawn, before the first boat launched, they snuck to the tank's far shore, where mist clung like a veil. There, amid lotus blooms heavy with dew, Vikram pulled her close. "I've photographed temples from Kashmir to Kerala," he confessed, his breath warm against her temple, "but none hold a candle to you. Stay with me, Aruna. Let me be your wanderer, not just passing through."

Tears pricked her eyes, salty as the sea. "And leave Puri? The temple calls me, Vikram. But you... you've awakened something. Like chandan on parched skin."

He kissed her then, slow and reverent, tasting of jaggery sweets and promise. The sun crested, gilding the water, as distant drums heralded the yatra's next rite. In that embrace, the festival's magic wove around them—sandalwood's whisper promising that love, too, could cool the soul's hidden fires.

As Chandan Yatra drew to its close, with the deities returning triumphantly to the temple amid fireworks that painted the sky in devotion's colors, Aruna and Vikram stood hand in hand on the ghat. He had extended his stay, his editor forgotten; she had confided in her family, who smiled knowingly, for hadn't the gods smeared a stranger with chandan as a sign? In Puri's eternal dance of ritual and romance, they had found their verse—a love born of paste and procession, enduring like the temple's ancient stones.