— Do you think you can hold me?
— We’ll do our best, Mr. Grindelwald.
L'amour est
une prison
Où chacun voudrait bien courir
Avec pour condamnation
D'y toujours vivre et d'y mourir
Messieurs de la Haute Cour
Voyez, j'attends mon tour
L'amour est une prison
Où l'on passe ses nuits
À goûter mille émotions
Et à faire des folies
Et les heures
Si légères
Semblent trop brèves
L'amour est une prison
Qui n'a pas de barreaux
On peut choisir l'évasion
Ou rester au cachot
Où l'on aime
Où l'on rêve
Où l'on se grise
Karroch was born a child of the stocks. His mother died in childbirth; his father, a farrier for the Last King of Slom, was trampled to death when Karroch was five. Afterward Karroch was indentured to the king’s menagerie, where he grew up among all the beasts of the royal court: lions, apes, fell-deer, and things less known, things barely believed in. When the lad was seven, an explorer brought in a beast like none before seen. Dragged before the King in chains, the beast spoke, though its mouth moved not. Its words: a plea for freedom. The King only laughed and ordered the beast perform for his amusement; and when it refused, struck it with the Mad Scepter and ordered it dragged to the stocks.
Over the coming months, the boy Karroch sneaked food and medicinal draughts to the wounded creature, but only managed to slow its deterioration. Wordlessly, the beast spoke to the boy, and over time their bond strengthened until the boy found he could hold up his end of a conversation—could in fact speak now to all the creatures of the King's menagerie. On the night the beast died, a rage came over the boy. He incited the animals of the court to rebel and threw open their cages to set them amok on the palace grounds. The Last King was mauled in the mayhem. In the chaos, one regal stag bowed to the boy who had freed him; and with Beastmaster astride him, leapt the high walls of the estate, and escaped. Now a man, Karroch the Beastmaster has not lost his ability to converse with wild creatures. He has grown into a warrior at one with nature’s savagery.
— Merlin! This is one of the two…possibly three moments in my life where I’ve actually been glad to see you.
— That’s my thoughts exactly, Sire. How’re you feeling?
— Like death. Well, death warmed up, at least.
— I can imagine.
— Hm. Well it seems like we’ve both been through something of an ordeal.
— It wasn’t so bad, really. Once you get use to the eternal night and the rats, and the moldy pillows, living with a bucket of your own…
— Merlin. I’m sorry about what happened to you. Truly. Soon as I heard, I told them it couldn’t have been you who poisoned me.
The rules are simple. Once you gone in, you don't come out.
— So, you been in jail? Do you ever feel bad about what you do?
— Everyone steals, Leslie. Some people admit it to themselves, some don't. It's what human beings do. That's why we invented locks. You think the people in these houses feel bad? Their grandparents and their great grandparents, they're the ones who got their hands dirty.
— I just mean, how do you sleep at night?
— I don't drink coffee after 7:00.