"I can," Gavon said. "But I need help mounting. Even without injuries, I wouldn't know how to do this."
"Don't worry about that. We know how to transport non-riders." The commander communicated silently with her dragonia again, and the rust-red dragon lowered herself as flat as she could manage on her small patch of stable ground. She and Jeffson helped Gavon hobble over, and between the two of them, they got him onto the dragonia's back behind the rider's position.
"Hold the grip. Don't let go, and don't lean." The commander strapped Gavon in with an efficiency that suggested she'd secured reluctant civilians many times before. "And don't look down if it bothers you."
"What if I need to throw up?"
"Turn your head to the side and aim downwind. My dragonia doesn't appreciate being soiled."
Commander Pentell mounted in front of him. "The other two dragons will land one at a time. The riders know what to do. You just need to help the injured get up, and they will do the rest. We'll take this group now and come back for the rest of you."
"Yes, ma'am," Jeffson saluted her.
"Thank you," I said, giving Gavon an encouraging smile.
The commander nodded, and then her dragonia launched from the slope with a powerful thrust, sending loose rocks cascading down the mountainside.
I watched them go and hoped Gavon would manage not to throw up.
The evacuation continued just as Commander Pentell had said, with one of the hovering dragons landing and collecting Denna.
Trevan, with his swollen knee, was next.
The rest of us waited for the dragons to return from their first round of evacuations.
"Scary beasts," Jeffson murmured next to me. "Useful, though."
I nodded. "Thank Elurion for the dragons. We would have died on this mountain without them."
Jeffson smiled sadly. "I wouldn't have allowed you to stay, Your Highness. I would have sent you down with the least injured porters."
I looked down my hooked nose at him. "As if I would have agreed to go and leave the others behind."
He smiled again. "I would have tricked you. Told you to get help and come back for us."
"It wouldn't have worked. I would have insisted that you get down and get help while I stayed behind with the injured."
We argued until the dragons returned for the rest of us.
The pickup continued in the same manner. A single dragon landed while the others held position above. A passenger mounted behind the rider, was strapped in, and then the dragon launched into the air, sending debris skittering down the slope.
With each departure, the mountainside grew emptier and quieter.
Jeffson, Kelth, Sorel, and I were the last four remaining when the dragons returned for the final pickups.
"You should go next," Jeffson told me.
"I go last."
He looked like he wanted to argue but recognized the expression on my face and nodded.
Sorel went first, then Kelth.
Jeffson and I waited on the mountainside with one dragon circling above and the vast, empty silence pressing in around us.
The dragon descended for Jeffson, and once he was mounted behind the rider, he gave me a nod that expressed more respect than he'd shown me during the entire expedition.
And then I was alone.
