Following injury to Jason De Vos, Royle moved for the 31-year-old South African international.
"Jason is out for two to four weeks with cracked ribs so we have brought Mark in," Royle said.
"When I found out that Jason was going to be out for a while I spent most of Sunday on the phone to try and bring in an extra body and finalised the details with Alan Curbishley.
"Mark hasn't had much pre-season football but is keen to join us and he will start against QPR."