Elixir

Chapter One

Taylor stood atop the cliff of Guethary. The hill's curved ascent formed an immense sound baffle so that the ocean roared at him from all sides. Below him the narrow cobblestone lane snaked between red-roofed Basque houses to the medieval harbor. Further out to sea, the cliff's natural enclosure had been extended into great stone arms. These protective walls rose twenty feet above the ocean's surface and narrowed the harbor mouth. Today the surf was so mammoth each inside wave crashed over the walls and bathed the stone in foam. A mist rose from the skirmish of water against rock, drifting like earthbound clouds. Taylor Knox breathed the salt-laden air and knew a piercing regret over having been brought to this magnificent realm on such an impossible quest.

A trio of doll-sized surfers began the paddle through the harbor entrance and out into the wash. The outside break was gigantic. Even from this height, Taylor knew that he was staring at the biggest waves he had ever seen. It was one thing to dream about surfing the behemoths of the Basque country. It was another thing entirely to have no excuse for not paddling out.

"Puts the old gut in a right twist, that." Kenny Dean was a Brit who had migrated from London to Devon by way of Australia's Gold Coast. "First time I caught sight of the heavies out there, I felt the old fear factor grab my throat like a noose." He clapped Taylor on the shoulder. "Cheer up, Yank. It's a lot worse than it looks."

Red Harris moved up to Taylor's other side. "I don't see how that's possible."

"Get yourself down to sea level; things will look different, believe you me." Kenny sounded vastly satisfied with the prospect. "Eyeball to eyeball, these beasties have a way of positively clearing the mind."

There were a lot of people watching, but fewer than two dozen surfers in the water. Taylor stood in a tiny park on a cliffside promontory, surrounded by surfers from around the globe-Japan, Brazil, Spain, Portugal, California, New Zealand, France, Australia. Knights in neoprene armor, drawn by the prospect of battling the mythical dragons in their deep blue realm.

"Time to motivate," Kenny urged. "It doesn't get better with the waiting."

The three of them suited up and started down the cobblestone lane. The alley was shadowed by the close-set Basque houses, all of them whitewashed and asymmetrical. The Basque considered their village architecture a gesture of both unity and defiance. The bright red roofs shone in the sunlight like brilliant steps clambering up the Pyrenees cliffside.

They rounded the final corner and halted. The blue sky and light offshore wind were mocked by rumbling thunder. All the gaily colored Basque fishing boats were in harbor today. Late August and early September marked the first of the big Arctic howlers, lows deeper than hurricane eyes and storms broad as Greenland. Two thousand miles north, a tempest was sending out waterborne mountains. For the past three days, as Taylor and his traveling buddies had made their way south from the Normandy ferry port, all the French surf shops and surfers' hostels had meteorological charts tacked to their front doors. Forget the tourist brochures and their photos of placid Riviera waters. This was France's other face. The Basque locals still called the Bay of Biscay by its medieval name, the Bone Coast.

The water was jewellike beyond the harbor walls, flattening between sets until the sea became a vivid reflection of the sky's brilliant blue. Then the next set stacked up like liquid corduroy, and the first wave struck the harbor walls. The sound of water upon stone was a great booming wrath. The wash drenched the stone in white, then retreated. The boats were tucked up tight against the cliff walls, as far from the harbor mouth as possible. Even so, they rocked like bathtub toys.

And this was the inside wave.

The next wave hissed over the rock beach as Taylor launched himself into the sea. The retracting wave sucked him out fast. By his third stroke he was already halfway to the harbor mouth. The barrier rocks were big as cars, the stone arms they formed thirty feet thick. When the next breaking wave poured across in foamy whitewash, Taylor felt the thunder in his chest. The retreating wave drew him out and through the wall and into the inside break.

Once through the harbor entrance, Taylor passed into a deepwater channel. He had never paddled so hard in his life. The central channel remained calm, save for miniature whirlpools spun by the crashing waves. To either side, the furious torrent boomed over the harbor rocks.

Taylor pulled over the last of the set waves and entered a calm interlude. The sea mocked him with placid serenity, impersonal in its power. Taylor's two companions drew up to either side, puffing from both the paddle and the realm they had entered.

Ahead, the channel broadened. Taylor could see the stream spread out like rippling underwater fingers. The tidal suction lessened, but further out the set waves formed long unbroken walls. Which meant timing for the final outside push was a matter of survival.

The world's seventh-deepest ocean basin was only twenty miles off the Basque coast. The entire coastline was shaped like cupped hands four hundred miles wide, forming the Bay of Biscay. The bay was aimed straight north, which meant that when the great Arctic storms created their mammoth surges, the Basque coast became crowned by the largest and thickest waves in the North Atlantic. From the second week in August to the last of November, seldom did a week pass without at least one day of waves over twenty feet.

The next set arrived. To either side of Taylor's deepwater perch, the inside waves jacked up twice his height. Call them twelve feet. A bodyboarder took off and screamed his way down the face, flying so fast he skipped like a Styrofoam rock over the surface. Then the wave's lip came down like a blue-crystal fist and hammered the bodyboarder into liquid oblivion.

Taylor turned shoreward. The harbor mouth looked miniscule from here. He could actually see the wash suck through, a great hush of water. The only way in was to face the lineup, catch a wave, and surf it away from the port. To the north, a hardscrabble beach formed the only safe exit. As another set wave rose and broke to either side, Taylor watched three surfers clamber over the rocks and stumble up a path that meandered along the cliffside. He tracked further up to the cliffside park, full of watchers. Beyond them, a group of older locals stood beneath the plantain shade trees and observed both the surfers and a game of pelota.

Taylor focused on the cliffside scene and did his best to ignore the raging fury to either side. He was living a dream. Of course he was afraid. But he would not let that fear defeat him. He would ignore how the surfers stumbled in abject exhaustion as they mounted the cliffside path. He would think instead of the green and purple mountains, the golden drifting mist, the beauty of this day.

Taylor found himself recalling the lessons he had studied back in Iona. The Scottish monk's voice became intensely audible. The old man could have been seated there beside him, sharing this day of crystal blue. The monk's name was Brother Jonah, and he had known his own time in the whale's gullet, though he had never told Taylor the entire story. Only that God had been forced to seal Jonah inside his greatest fear to gain his attention. The monk was stunted and twisted like the shoreline cedars of St. Augustine, Taylor's home. But Jonah's eyes were as vivid as this day, and his voice held such gentle passion he could speak to Taylor about things Taylor had spent a lifetime ignoring. And Taylor had listened. He listened...