Below the fighting grounds, where Venda men in Tshifudi, South Africa, have long sparred and bled, boys congregate on a riverside. During seasonal rains the river flows swiftly but now in December, at the peak of summer in the Southern Hemisphere, it is but a series of puddles where the boys splash and laugh and tease each other. On the banks they find shade and lean together—arms draped over shoulders—with an intimacy that will last only the length of boyhood’s tender years. The day is long and warm and free.

As the sun reaches its apex, an older man summons them from beyond the ridgeline. Other boys have gathered on the pitch and the fights will soon begin. A nervous energy