His heart beat fast and tight inside his chest. His pulse thumped in his distended neck. His breath came in short, harsh gasps. He felt like he was going to explode, that skin, muscle, bone would literally explode, that in moments he would be so much offal on the woodland floor. All that would be left to hang onto, to recognise that he once was, would be his heart beats, beats strangled within the branches of trees as they scraped across the sky.
