But this was . . . a hundred or more. He was staring at more dragons in one place than he’d ever thought possible.

He opened his mouth to order any man with a bow to draw his arrow, but for once his voice failed him. Wave after wave of scarlet dragons, dozens upon dozens of them, soared down from above, plunging to meet the lead warships. There were riders on the dragons’ backs, he saw – soldiers in armor of chain. The pale-faced warriors held huge swords, spears, and axes in one hand while the other gripped metal reins as red as the beasts they commanded.

In an instant the sky was a confusion of flying monsters, separating further into groups of three and four, diving down onto the ships. Archers on the nearest warship in the forward line fired arrows that bounced harmlessly off the dragons’ tough hides. Fixing his stunned eyes on the biggest of them all, Kargan saw its jaws bite down on a bowman, tearing him in half. Its rider, a tall warrior with long, gray-streaked hair swept past the file of archers, decapitating one man after another with his broadsword. Behind him, a stocky man with bushy eyebrows bent down from his own dragon to strike his axe into the crewmen who were trying to flee in terror.

Every ship in the first wave suddenly had half a dozen dragons snapping and tearing over it like scavengers on a corpse. On a distant bireme, a blinding silver light appeared at the end of a robed man’s staff, accompanied by a powerful blast that threw a dozen crewmen into the water. An ear-splitting sound filled the air and everywhere archers’ weapons fell out of their hands as they collapsed and clapped their hands over their ears. Seeing the tall warrior make another sweep, clearing the ship’s deck with every blow of his sword, Kargan noticed his braided beard and face set in a mask of fierce determination, and then with a start he realized who he must be.

Palemon was more powerful than he’d ever imagined. This magic . . . He couldn’t begin to comprehend it.

All along the warships of the forward line, brave soldiers who’d fought across the empire were throwing down their weapons and leaping over the sides of their vessels. The ships themselves were surprisingly intact; the dragons and their riders were targeting the crews, leaving the vessels undamaged.