Dragon's Secret, book one: The Dragon Thief

Part 10

My only thought before we hit was 'Gods, this will hurt.' And then I was on the ground, my head lolling to the side, pain coursing through my veins, and not the firey burn of a cut or knife wound, nor the stinging burn of a whip, nor the inferno-feeling pain of burns. No, this pain wasn't hot at all. 'Such a weird sensation.' I mused. It was pain in its purest form - no heat to hide behind. The pain almost came in ripples, one second manageable the next, unbearable. I never would've gotten up except for I suddenly had a jolt of panic, remembering Mystic had hit the ground face-down and could have been badly injured, maybe even paralyzed. I surveyed Mystic's prone form. Her wings were spread-eagle, bent at angles that didn't look particularly healthy. One of her legs was buried under a pile of rocks that had been knocked off a rock spire  a couple hundred feet away. Several scales, each about 6 inches long and 4 inches wide, were knocked off and where scattered on the ground on Mystic. Pale, wrinkled patches of flesh were where the scales had been. The little minor dragon, a purple-gray color, crawled onto Mystic's snout, curled up, and promptly fell asleep. The minor dragon diverted my thoughts to the  dragon thief. She had obviously heard the crash, but kept on flying to the East. Just as she was almost out of sight, She suddenly veered Northwest. 'Wha... Ooohhhh. Flying East was a trick, to make the Academy try to find her there, not to the North.' I thought. 'Clever. But where in the North would she want to go?' As I thought about it, Mystic slowly regained consciousness. 'Up there, there is only coldness.' I thought. Mystic slowly stumbled into a standing-ish position. She lowered her left shoulder, trying to get me to climb on,but then collapsed under her own weight. "No, Mystic. Just stay put until help comes, okay?" I said to Mystic. My thoughts went back to the minor dragon that Mystic was trying to remove from her snout. For being unconscious, it was putting up quite a fight.  Mystic finally gave up after making a giant 'humpf' sound, and letting out some smoke. 'Maybe the minor dragon can go get help.' I thought. 'No... it might fly off or get lost or distracted. But what can I do otherwise? But I never even heard of minor dragons and why bother stealing them if they weren't valuable? No, I'd be in so much trouble if I lost the last one left...' My brain continued to go in circles for a few minutes, during which time, at some point Mystic drifted off to sleep. Suddenly, as I was about to send the minor dragon to get help, I heard wing beats. I looked up, for my rescuers had come! I started waving my arms, trying to attract my savior's attention. I tried to figure out who it was. I didn't recognize their dragon, nor their long, wavy brown hair. 'Its the one who threw the minor dragons out of the window.' I realized. 'Making their own escape.' I tried to send another wave of magic at them, but my already small reserves were completely depleted, so all my magic did was a small stirring of the wind. I cursed myself as the thieves flew off into the distance and all I could do was stare. I waited for a rescue party to get me, and just when I started to think Sruth would rather abandon me, wing beats sounded, and a dragon flew out of the rock spires, with none other than Palo on its back. I collapsed back in gratitude and within the hour, I was back at the academy eating dolce.