Earth's first faster than light, First Light is stranded on Veyra, in the Serevan system.
The drive failure forces them to land because the ship can’t safely hold its damaged field while the crew repairs it. Veyra looks reassuringly familiar: open grassland, scattered trees, herds of enormous animals. Then the crew sees Pale Maw run down an African bull elephant and kill it by trampling.
At first, the crew thinks they’ve found a rhino-like animal. Then they see its teeth—and realize this world’s familiar shapes conceal unfamiliar predators. They need to finish repairs before Pale Maw, or anything else in Veyra’s ecosystem, finds the landing site. The ship’s damaged drive gives them a hard deadline: repair it, launch, and get out of the Serevan system before the planet notices them.