Runt awoke to a world of pain. It was not a tidy awakening, where there was one moment of unconsciousness and then a stark return to reality. No, Runt underwent a slow and painful return to the world of the living. His first sensation was the mud still pooling below his face, the laboured way his body was breathing, his mind a confused morass of conflicting information. For a few minutes he laid there, sure that he was dead before the pain hit him in full force. He quickly realized that death would have been less painful than what he was experiencing, and ruled that out as he took another shuddering muck filled breath.

Slowly as to not disturb his bruised neck, he adjusted his face, turning it to one side and slowly raising one hand to pick at the mud that caked his features. He felt cold drops against his face, droplets that slowly worked to aide his cause to clean his face. Liquid of a less foul sort entering his mouth as a drizzle began to rescue him. His parched mouth drank what liquid it could reach, gulps still tasting of mud sliding down his throat in between laboured breaths. He laid like that for quite some time, the staggered rain above him cooling down swollen and bruised joints, granting him the barest amount of relief before the chill of the rain sank into his bones.

To say that Runt was lucky to be alive would be an understatement. Even as he laid there he felt the way his ribcage creaked and cracked, a rib jutting in the wrong direction digging into another painfully every time he dragged a breath into his lungs. The bumps and bruises along his scalp and skull told of a beating that lasted long after he had fallen unconscious, a viscous one full of malice and ill intent. Stank may have not been deliberately trying to kill Runt but he had come damn close to it. The rage he delivered being felt every moment that a rain drop collided with Runt’s scalp. A near constant drumming of pain that made his now mud cleared eyes wince with every moment the storm above him intensified.

But he was alive. Alive enough at least to cast his bleary red eyes around the camp, to see the low and thick fog that twisted as it made it’s way through the encampment. Crude leather tents barely fought to keep their inhabitants dry, poor planning pooling the water they collected into central locations that were quickly turning the camp into a series of miniature lakes. He slowly watched as one of those lakes began creeping towards him, time passing strangely in this pain twisted world he now inhabited. When the puddle began to dampen one side of his body he finally forced himself to move. Fighting through the pain that threatened to claim him once again he turned himself onto his back. Storm in full force above him now soaking his crude clothing and washing the rest of him clean. Runt stared upwards into the clouds above him, rain dripping down his green skin.

For a moment he thought he saw the same motes that had come to him just as he had begun to pass out, tiny drifting lights that came together, and then separated shortly afterwards in twisting patterns. He squinted as one passed an inch above his head, only for the motion to seemingly banish the faint energy by sending the little particle speeding away. He watched it’s path for a handful of heartbeats before he steeled himself once again to move.

A cough wracked his body as he suddenly jerked himself upwards and into a sitting position. Streams of water running down his cheeks and leaving rapidly chilling trails. His red hair plastered itself to his skin in strings, curling down below his chin and letting the rain run along it’s length to pool below him. With a groan of pain he struggled to stand, shaky arms squelching into the mud as he poured his effort into the endeavour. His first attempt led to his arms failing him, the stumble causing him to slip and slide back into the mud below him. Another coughing fit and he pulled himself up shortly afterwards to try again. This time he was able to stand, albeit on uncertain legs. His body screamed in protest but Runt would not allow himself to listen to it. If his body wished to simply sit in the mud until he drowned, he would drag it to the shore. Which he did with every shaking step he took towards the edge of the encampment. He had a destination in mind, which every pained step slowly took him towards.

It was where he always took himself during storms like this. While others shared the tents that surrounded him Runt had always preferred the solitude of another location. Not that the others would have allowed him into their shelters anyways. Those were reserved for those who deserved to be kept dry. Those that had set the shelters up, or those with enough to bribe them with to be let inside. Or simply strong enough to beat the shit out of anyone who complained about their presence. The injured Runt had none of those things.

Instead he headed to the bowed and cracked willow tree he called his own. He could see it looming out of the fog that surrounded him. A lightning struck tree that must have loomed over the swamp at one point of time, but now laid half burned and submerged in the mud that made up his swampy home. The bows had long been cleared of leaves, but the branches that remained still retained enough covering to keep off the worst of the rain. The seared remains of the trunk had enough carved away to only add to that. A small hide that he had found to escape from the worst of the camp when he needed to.

Grumbling he shoved a dried branch to one side, the wood cracking and falling to his feet as he stumbled forwards. With a groan he crawled deeper for a moment before leaning up against the wood of the tree. A deep sigh and he stretched out, finally allowing himself to relax and take stock of his wounds. Delicate and practised fingers prodded and poked at every wound that he could find. Figuring which ones were just bruised, and which ones hid more hidden wounds. He took stock, and counted along with every wound he found. Three broken fingers, two broken ribs, and one very busted ankle. Runt didn’t have the time for self pity, and to tell the truth while this was the worst beating he had received, none of the injuries were foreign to him. He grumbled to himself, and snarled in pain as he cracked his fingers back into place one by one, gathering sticks in between pops. A bent claw would saw at the material of his damp shirt, crudely slicing it. Jamming each finger into place he wrapped the rag around each one, cinching it and tying a crude knot a moment later. His ankle he did much the same, using a larger stick to keep it in place and tearing a larger hole out of his muddy shirt. He knew there was not much he could do about his broken ribs, so instead he just adjusted his posture, letting himself stretch out upon the somewhat dry leaves below him.

Runt did not know the miracle that had let him tend to his wounds in the first place. He had only the faintest memories of the feeling that had preceded his blackout. The power that had flowed through him in that moment and blemished his soul with soot. He had not felt Stank grabbing his club once again, nor the blows that had cracked his skull upon the muddy ground. He was gone when his heart stopped, when the lifeblood in his veins ceased to flow. He was not aware as the miracle his god had designated for him had come to pass. A healing that had begun as soon as Stank had wandered away, his energy spent and his prize claimed.

Runt’s heart had begun to beat again as the power flowed through him. Restarting his life functions before burning out, the magic searing through him in an uncontrolled and twisted path. Power that weakened before it had completed it’s task. Only the remnants of the beating Runt had received being tended to now. Other remnants of the miracle simmered below the surface, his soul now stained with the taint of his god. Wounds of a nature he didn’t have a concept of.

Gurz’ga’nal had not given this miracle lightly, for they were not a god who had much power to spare. Nor were they a god who was predisposed to kindness or mercy. Runt had no awareness of the price he had paid, nor was he aware of any deal he had made. The god had stepped over that, taking their price as payment for saving the youths life. That price was a twist to his fate. A life spared where it should have been lost. A wrench now thrown into a balanced system that had accounted for Runt’s death. A system that would reject the change, order now forced to deal with a dash of chaos. Chaos that the young god wished to take advantage of.

Chaos that Runt was now destined to be a part of. Even Gurz’ga’nal had no idea what the nature of that change would be. They had most likely just postponed Runt’s death until shortly in the future. Perhaps Runt would die in another’s place. Or maybe this change would amount to nothing. A wrench thrown into a realm much too robust to buckle. Runt would simple fade, and fail to achieve anything. As Gurz’ga’nal’s awareness drifted away from Runt they thought it would be the later. The small green skinned youth, shivering and hiding away from the rain, had hardly survived his encounter earlier that evening. Gurz’ga’nal had more potential candidates, those who they thought had more potential to change the realms that they inhabited. Runt was just one of twelve and Gurz’ga’nal, ever the betting kind, decided to give Runt the lowest odds of all.

From Runt’s blurry perspective the visit and departure of his god was barely a blip he paid attention to. The faintest cluster of motes catching his attention before scurrying away on a trajectory that led to it zooming by over his head. The perception that again when he focused upon it faded from his gaze. Propping himself up against the log behind him, he settled in to wait out the storm. His eyes watching as droplets fell and crashed around him, the sounds of animal life slowly returning to the world as he watched. A nest of birds somewhere in the tree around him chirping softly to each other, a few large beetles that clambered over his hands and limbs. Two meeting their end between his teeth as he lazily caught them. Soon though the sounds of the wind and the rain lulled him to pain filled and dreamless sleep.

When he awoke he felt marginally better, the sun sneaking it’s way through the branches overhead warming his skin and soothing the worst of his wounds. Tired eyes looked around him, confused for a moment before they placed what had driven him from his slumber. A dark shadow stretched in between the limbs that cradled him, another of his kind had approached as he slept. Their shadow the only thing that had warned Runt, the black outline stretching between the branches that guarded him and flickering the sunlight enough to catch his attention.

“What?” he managed to croak out, his voice barely hiding the strained way it spoke. Every breath pained him, but he fought to keep that knowledge hidden from the intruder. The moment they figure spoke, he recognized them, a snarl forming on his lips even before they had finished speaking.

“Brother,” rumbled Blackeye, his yellowed and sunken eyes peering between bowed branches, “I’ve got a deal to make with you.”