Chapter Three

"Excellent, Shinon!" Greil praises, thumping the skinny boy on his lower back. "That was excellent. You'd be ready for mercenary work right now if perhaps you were a little more bulked up."

"It wasn't fast enough," Shinon frowns, staring at his hands in disgust.

It has been two years since Greil first took Shinon in. The original plan was to let him stay until he was healthy enough to send elsewhere, but it quickly became apparent that Shinon was going to be a permanent fixture. Both Greil and his wife Elena had become attached to the red-haired boy, how he was always hungry, how he slept so peacefully, how he clumsily tried to help Elena with the baby. They decided they just couldn't let him go.

Now at twelve years old, Shinon's skill with a bow has startled and delighted Greil. Shinon is happy to see his caretaker excited at his precise shooting, but he himself is never satisfied. His technique isn't perfected yet. His motion isn't swift enough yet. And he never, never, never shoots fast enough.

"What do you mean, it wasn't fast enough?" Greil stares at the young archer. "You prepared and shot that arrow at lightning speed, Shinon. That would have been a fatal shot and the enemy would have had no idea that you'd even drawn your bow."

"It wasn't fast enough," Shinon repeats, frustrated with himself.

In a way, Shinon is not quite as angry at himself as he is with his father. After all, he's the reason Shinon has to perfect everything. His father had him shooting arrows at age five and pounded perfection on him. As Shinon got older, it became literal. His father's voice always came out in a scream: "That was too slow!" "You're clumsy!" "Are you ever going to learn or am I just wasting my time with a worthless whelp?" Firing the arrow too slow earned a shove. Missing the center of the target earned a harsh slap across the face. If Shinon were nervous and missed the target entirely, that earned a flogging.

Memories swirling in Shinon's mind, he whips out an arrow from his quiver and fires it immediately. It sails through the air and strikes the middle of the target, squeezed beside the previous arrow he'd shot.

"It's not fast enough!" Shinon cries in anger, grabbing his hair. He quickly lets go, not wanting to pull it out. It's another thing his father said wasn't perfect. Shinon had always wanted to grow his hair long, but his father required his hair to be short. The more Shinon complained, the shorter it was cut. Now, under the care of Greil, Shinon can grow his hair as long as he wants to. Rage burning inside for his father, Shinon is determined to grow it out very, very long.

"Why can't I do this?" Shinon wails, reaching for another arrow. His hand flies so quickly that Greil doesn't catch it before it fires another arrow, eliciting an agonized "It's never fast enough!" from the archer.

"Shinon, stop," Greil commands, grabbing Shinon's arms and turning the young archer towards him. Shinon looks at the ground, ashamed of his lack of ability. Greil has to repeat "look at me, Shinon" three times before Shinon finally lifts his head up to see Greil's face.

"You're being impossible with yourself," Greil tells him sternly. "You're firing accurately at a blinding speed and you think you're too slow. Listen, I have always pushed my students to be the best that they can be, even beyond the limits they thought they had. I know what excellent fighting is, and I don't believe there's any possible way you can shoot faster than you already are."

Shinon believes there is. His father would be flying off the handle if he saw how slow his shots were.

"You're only twelve years old and you have an extraordinary gift at the bow," Greil says, staring right into the boy's face. "You have to start believing in yourself, Shinon. These two years you've been living with us, I still have very little idea of your past. However, someone must have installed this unforgiving perfectionist streak in you, and you need to overcome it. See your ability for what it really is, Shinon. You're a fantastic archer."

As Greil pulls him into a manly hug, Shinon wishes deep down that Greil was his father. That baby Ike is a very lucky kid.