"What is wrong with you?" Osborne demanded. "This is no time for dreams!"

Mayhew's attention snapped back to the approaching guard. As he entered a circle of torchlight, Mayhew saw for the first time that something was wrong with the guard's face. Revolted yet fascinated, he tried to see the detail behind the guard's pawing hands. The skin was unduly white and had the texture of sackcloth. When the hands came away, Mayhew was sickened to glimpse large dark eyes that resembled nothing so much as buttons, and a row of stitches where the mouth had been. An illusion, he tried to tell himself, but he was left with an impression of the dollies the old women sold in Cheapside at Christmastime.

"God's wounds!" Osbourne exclaimed. "What has happened to him?"

Before Mayhew could answer, a blur of ochre and brown burst from the shadows with a terrible roar, slamming the guard onto the turf. Claws revealed bones and organs, and tearing jaws sprayed viscera around the convulsing form. But the most chilling thing was that the guard did not utter a sound.

He could not, Mayhew thought.

The lion's triumphant roar jolted Mayhew and Osborne from their shock.

"The beasts have escaped the Menagerie!" Mayhew thrust Osborne back towards the White Tower, where they ordered the guards who remained within to bar the door and defend it with their lives.

On the steps, Osborne rested one hand on the stone and bowed his head, fighting the waves of panic that threatened to consume him.

Mayhew eyed him contemptuously. "When you volunteered to become one of Walsingham's men, you vowed to deal with the great affairs of state with courage and fortitude. Now look at you."