Dedicated to my brother, Dennis Biondo, who would have turned 68 today.

We arrived at 6 a.m. just as the pride seemed to be finishing up its meal. Before I go on, perhaps a warning is in order: this blog will be real, which means graphic. As the comedian Michelle Wolf says, this is no time to be cute.

Lions kill. They eat what they kill. They eat on the spot. And the biggest ones eat the most and when they want.

In the African bush it’s called precisely what it is: “a kill.” Witnessing any part of a kill is to see the enactment of the circle of life in its entirety.

This is the Tembe Pride, which lives south of the river that cuts through the reserve. This pride includes two adult females and five cubs. They have surrounded an adult zebra carcass and are feeding on it with great might. Tearing the skin away from the meat and meat away from the bones takes every bit of strength these cubs have. That’s if they can get close enough to feed. The two adult females have the best positions.

Two young black-backed jackals make a wide circle around the pride. They inch their way closer and closer to nibble at bits of entrails. They are too small to be a threat, and the lions ignore them.

In the distance, we see two spotted hyenas approaching. Then three, four, five, six. They are big. They hold their tails high and their fur is standing up. They trot toward the lions whooping and calling with more confidence than they deserve.

Without warning, the two female lions leap up and run directly into the hyenas. The larger cubs follow. All roar, deep and loud with power.

The hyenas scatter and squeal, their distinct laugh echoes through the bush. That laugh is pure evil, what you’d expect in a Stephen King movie.

I am stunned. Holding my hand to my heart, trying to comprehend this moment of raw reality at 6:15 in the morning. I can’t help but root for the lions.

Mike, our ranger and owner of Siyafunda Endangered Species Reserve, has been narrating the events. He points out that the hyenas look as if they, too, have recently eaten and perhaps they killed the zebra the night before. They could have been eating on it when the Tembe Pride happened upon the kill and stole it away from the hyenas.

With the hyenas gone, the lions refocus on the kill, which clearly belongs to them now. What had looked like a nearly clean carcass is actually only a half. The lions pull and pull to turn the zebra over and begin eating the other half.

Without warning, there’s roaring and growling reverberating from beyond as two adult male lions run out of the wooded area and chase the females and cubs away.

Shaka and Kubu, the eight-year-old brothers that are pushing south to dominate the Tembe Pride, have entered the story.

Mike focuses our attention on the behavior of the adult females, which ran off to settle under a tree, and watch Shaka and Kubu finish their zebra. The cubs followed.

“This is the first interaction between Shaka and Kubu and this pride,” he says. “The females are relaxed, not aggressive, which means they’re accepting and the two new males have just expanded their territory.”

I can’t write fast enough. So excited to witness this territorial takeover when Mike receives a radio call indicating the females have moved to another kill close by.

We follow in the jeep and find the two females with cubs eating a small zebra. It is clear that the two zebras, mother and calf, were killed together.

We back away after awhile when Mike stops to talk to another ranger who announces Kalahari Jr. and Zamula, the two elderly male lions, are at the original kill.

“Let’s go have a look,” Mike says, turning back to the site of the original kill. When we arrive, the zebra carcass is picked nearly clean with jackals and vultures circling. In the wooded area just beyond, the two great lions we had been seeing for two weeks are resting in the shade.

It’s Kalahari Jr. and Zamula. Shaka and Kubu are gone. Chased away by the Kings of this pride.

The territorial expansion of the younger males will have to wait. These two great beasts lying in the shade digesting the last of the zebra are going nowhere.

The Timbe Pride remains theirs. For now.