Realistic lion head on the back of a hand

Mind the gatehouse stair when you come up, the mortar has gone soft since the frost. I finally got the lion off the keystone at Carrow Keep, the one the old lords called Rhys, though nobody living knows why. It came away in three pieces and they are wrapped in sacking under my cot, where the damp can't reach them.

The mane is what held me. Whoever cut it worked the chisel against the grain so every curl stands out like a flame, and the face looks down on whoever comes through the arch with a patience I find hard to bear. Mrs Ashdown from the village says it is bad luck to move a beast from a gate. I told her the gate had moved first, and she crossed herself and went home without her eggs.

Last night the wind came through the west wall and I sat with the pieces in lamplight, fitting the broken jaw back against the cheek. The stone was warmer than it had any right to be. I kept thinking of the steward's ledger, which says the lion was set facing inward, toward the hall, so the keep was always watching itself. Facing out, it kept the lord's enemies away. Facing in, the house kept its own counsel.

I have turned it round. Come up Thursday with the cart and leave the boy at home. We'll set it back by the well, where nothing can take it from us, and you can tell me whether I have made the mane too wild. I know you think I am soft on the old beast. Yours, Hal.