“Mission for the day is to see cats,” I wrote in my journal on Wednesday, June 12th. What followed would be the most spectacular morning of wildlife viewing I’ve ever experienced—and the inspiration for some of Blood Oath’s most intense sequences.

By noon, we had witnessed a mother leopard calling to her cubs, discovered an orphaned lion cub clinging to survival beside a wildebeest carcass, tracked a cheetah family through short grass, observed more than a dozen lions from the legendary Seronera Pride, and watched thousands of wildebeest erupt into their synchronized migration run. It was a masterclass in predation, survival, and the brutal elegance of the circle of life.

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The Leopard’s Dawn

We arrived at the Thach Kopje around 8 AM to find dozens of jeeps already positioned, their occupants scanning the grassland with binoculars. Then she appeared—the mother leopard we’d glimpsed the day before, emerging from tall grass and walking directly through the gathered vehicles with the casual confidence of absolute power.

James quickly maneuvered our Land Cruiser around the backside of the kopje, positioning us perfectly to see her climbing the ancient granite. Halfway up, she stopped on an exposed rock and began calling—a low, rumbling vocalization that carried across the silent savannah. She was summoning her cubs to their rendezvous among the cracks and caverns of the rock outcrop.

Watching her survey the endless plains from that elevated vantage point, I understood why leopards choose these kopjes. In a landscape of unrelenting flatness, height equals survival. From up there, she could see threats approaching from kilometers away, spot potential prey, and call her young to safety.

In Blood Oath, when Alex needs to observe Lemarti’s compound, she positions herself on a granite outcrop exactly like this one. The tactical advantage is the same whether you’re a leopard protecting your cubs or a CIA operative planning a rescue: elevation provides visibility, and visibility provides control.

While we waited for her cubs to appear, Lynne spotted a spotted eagle owl tucked into a bush among the rocks. “James was impressed again!” I noted. My wife had developed an uncanny ability to spot wildlife that even our expert guide sometimes missed.

The Orphan

Around 9 AM, we came across a wildebeest carcass in grass beside the road. And there, barely visible in the shadows, lay a tiny lion cub—maybe three months old, alone and terrified.

We had driven past before realizing what we’d seen. When James reversed the Land Cruiser, the cub panicked and rolled himself back into taller grass. For several minutes, we caught glimpses of his head and ears before he lay down out of sight, conserving energy, waiting for a mother who might never return.

Just a few hundred yards down the road, we found a large male lion and female resting under a tree. James grew quiet, his usually animated narration replaced by a somber explanation. The presence of this new male so close to the abandoned cub told a brutal story: he had likely killed the pride’s previous male and was systematically eliminating cubs that carried another male’s genes. The cub we’d found might have been the only survivor.

“The male will kill off the cubs to force the female back into heat so that he can sire his own cubs,” James explained.

This harsh reality—infanticide as reproductive strategy—became thematically central to Blood Oath. In the novel, Alex witnesses a young boy soldier, Kijana, who has been orphaned and absorbed into Lemarti’s militia. Like that lion cub, he’s trying to survive in a world where the strong eliminate the weak, where family structures are shattered by violence, where adaptation means the difference between life and death. Alex’s mercy toward this child—her refusal to kill him even when it might save her father—echoes the complex moral landscape I first encountered watching that abandoned cub.

Speed Versus Stealth

At 10 AM, James spotted something that made him brake suddenly: a cheetah with three cubs in the short grassland. Unlike lions, who hunt through coordinated ambush, or leopards, who rely on vertical terrain and stealth, cheetahs are pure velocity. They need open ground and clear sight lines to unleash the explosive speed that makes them Earth’s fastest land animal.

The mother was teaching her cubs these fundamentals. We watched as she demonstrated the patient observation that precedes the chase—that absolute stillness where every muscle is coiled, every sense focused, waiting for the perfect moment to explode into action.

I got some good pictures, but didn’t linger. We didn’t want to disturb this crucial learning process. In a few months, these cubs would need to hunt successfully on their own or starve. Their mother’s lessons meant the difference between life and death.

This became Alex’s operational philosophy in Blood Oath: sometimes you stalk like a leopard, using height and cover. Sometimes you hunt like a lion, coordinating with your team. And sometimes—when the moment demands it—you strike like a cheetah with explosive, overwhelming speed.

The Seronera Pride: A Dynasty

What happened next, between 11 AM and noon, demonstrated why the Serengeti is considered the best place on Earth to observe lion behavior.

We drove to an area where a small stream cut through the grassland. Immediately, we spotted two female lions walking along the river edge. They approached the road, then jumped across the stream in perfect synchronization—muscles rippling, utterly focused.

We followed them for a couple of hundred yards to a hippo pool where dozens of hippos wallowed with their young. Then James led us back in the direction we’d seen the two females, and suddenly there were six more lions—more females and some younger ones.

“This is all the Seronera Pride,” James announced with evident pride in his voice. He’d been tracking this dynasty for years.

We continued on and found another group of five lions resting under a tree. “Also part of the Seronera Pride,” James confirmed.

In less than two hours, we had observed what researchers call a “super pride”—a coalition of over a dozen related lions controlling vast territory through strength in numbers. These super prides hunt cooperatively for large prey like buffalo and eland, their coordinated tactics reminiscent of military operations.

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Watching them, I understood what would drive the tactical sequences in Blood Oath. Caleb’s team—code-named RONIN—operates exactly like this Seronera Pride. Each member has a role. Moose with his heavy machine gun provides covering fire like the pride’s strongest hunters. Rook and his Delta teammates bring specialized combat skills. Alex herself functions as the pride’s scout and precision striker. When they assault Lemarti’s compound to rescue the general, they move with the same coordinated precision I witnessed that morning—trusting each other, communicating constantly, understanding that survival depends on the team.

The Greatest Show on Earth

Around noon, just down the road from the last group of lions, we encountered something that stopped us cold: a massive herd of thousands of wildebeest that James said represented “the last part of the great migration.”

We watched them grazing beside us, the males grunting and posturing for their small territories. The collective sound—thousands of animals communicating, competing, living—created a low rumble that seemed to emanate from the earth itself.

Then, suddenly, one or two animals began to move.

What happened next was like watching a circuit complete. The entire herd—thousands upon thousands of wildebeest—erupted into motion, running in single file along the plain in perfect synchronization. The sound was thunderous. The sight was biblical. The dust cloud they raised obscured the horizon.

“It was unbelievable,” I wrote, my handwriting barely legible because my hand was shaking.

This was the Great Migration—up to 1.2 million wildebeest following ancient instincts and rainfall patterns in a never-ending cycle of survival. It’s been called “the greatest show on Earth,” and witnessing even a fragment of it left me speechless.

In Blood Oath, I captured this same sense of unstoppable momentum in the climactic action sequences. Once violence is unleashed, it takes on its own terrible logic and rhythm—like the migration, it becomes both inevitable and impossible to look away from. When Alex and her team engage Lemarti’s forces and Tarasenko’s Russian mercenaries in a three-way firefight, the action moves with the same inexorable force as those wildebeest—driven by primal imperatives, following patterns written into DNA or training, impossible to stop once begun.

The Leopard’s Larder

After a picnic lunch, we came across a dead Thomson’s gazelle hanging from a branch in a tree—a leopard kill.

“The leopard would have fed as much as it wanted and then would leave the rest,” James explained. “But no other animal would eat it for fear of the leopard. It would just stay there for months.”

This grotesque monument to predator dominance—the gazelle’s body slowly mummifying in the African sun, untouched by scavengers out of sheer terror of the leopard’s return—became a powerful symbol in Blood Oath. Some kills serve as warnings. Some deaths echo long after the moment of violence passes. When Alex leaves bodies behind in her pursuit of her father’s kidnappers, she’s sending the same message that leopard sent: I was here. I am capable. Fear me.

The Mathematics of Survival

That morning taught me something crucial about both wildlife and thriller writing: survival isn’t about being the biggest or the fastest or the strongest. It’s about understanding your environment, knowing your capabilities, and acting with decisive precision when the moment arrives.

The leopard succeeded through stealth and patience. The cheetah through speed and timing. The lions through cooperation and numerical superiority. The wildebeest through collective instinct and constant movement.

In Blood Oath, Alexandra Martel employs all these strategies. Sometimes she’s the solitary leopard, using kopjes for observation and planning. Sometimes she’s part of a coordinated pride, each member playing their role. Sometimes she strikes with cheetah speed—as when she rescues Adiya from the market in Mwanza, eliminating threats and vanishing into the crowd in seconds. And always, like the wildebeest, she keeps moving, because stopping means death.

What’s Coming

Next Thursday, we’ll explore our final day in the Serengeti and reflect on the broader cultural connections we discovered—the way this ancient landscape shaped not just wildlife but human consciousness, the lessons that transcend species and circumstance. We’ll also examine how everything we experienced came together in the writing of Blood Oath.

But this morning—with its procession of predators and prey, hunters and hunted, survivors and casualties—taught me the most important lesson of all: In Africa, as in life, the circle never stops turning. Every ending is another beginning. Every death feeds new life. Every loss creates space for something else to emerge.

In Blood Oath, Alexandra Martel enters that circle when her father is taken. What she becomes by the time she emerges on the other side will surprise even her.

Asante sana for witnessing this great hunt with me. One final journey awaits.

Steve Urszenyi

Blood Oath releases November 18, 2025—just 19 days away. Preorder your copy today and discover how the greatest show on Earth inspired Alexandra Martel’s most dangerous mission.

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