If your thermostats probe is inside you should have a fail safe on the heat mat. This will kill the power to the heater if the probe gets moved. I would go so far as to say that only proprtional units be used like this and even farther that only units that have an under temp shut down be used. Probes no matter where they are placed should resist your efforts to move them there should be no way a snake child dog cat be able to.
To me it looks like the beginning of a burn more than shed. Hard to say conclusively. If it is a light burn a shed will follow soon. The first step of a burn to to asses what happened and fix it. The second step is to assess your ambient air temp. The fact a snake will lay on a too hot spot and become burned rather than move off to the cool spot has been hotly debated. The most current theories (my personal guess aligns with this years exotic vet conference in Florida) that low ambient temps are the cause. The drive to thermoregulate over rides the move instinct. It seems snakes use a core temp not skin temp to regulate . Low air temps drop the core and allow the snake to become burned.
Treatment is easy (if it is a burn at all) the surface of the skin is not breached so just keep it clean and dry, replace the substrate with paper towels and keep a close eye out for blisters or other infections or other wise. (if there is a hole, blisters ect. then a vet is needed) It might be worth having a vet look at it IF you have a good reptile vet handy. (personally I would wait I think but nobody from this form can make medical judgements over the internet you need to make the vet call.)
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