Rudra

This happened a long time ago. A close confidant of Indra, after conversing with him on various matters relating to the realms, brought up the issue of Rudra.

"Why is it that the Quarternity dare do nothing about the fierce one?, " she asked. The unsaid assumption was that he was beyond the reach of the Gods themselves.

"People honor most of the gods who are killer... Rudra is a killer. And so are Skanda, Agni, Varun.  Yama is a killer. So am I. He is different from us, but he is also not that apart from us. Suggesting that he is an issue would imply we are a problems," Indra replied, after much thought.

His anger was variously described as irascible. Furious. Terrible. Savage, wild.

His named literally meant howler, his fame had spread far and apart. He was the master of poison and medicine, of  consciousness-altering drugs, and their application at range. He could induce sensation of flying and viewing one's own body from outside on anyone at a distance, earning terror and respect from friends and foes alike.

He was the embodiment of wildness, unpredictable danger and fever. He was a healer and cooler who also attacked like 'a ferocious wild beast'. He lived on the margins of the civilized world as someone who came from the outside, an intruder, and was excluded from gaining the benefits of sacrifices made by humans.

The gods feared his powers and wrath would be intolerably awesome.

He was a hunter. He stood for what what is violent, cruel and impure in the society of gods, or at the edge of the divine world. And that was just the one of him.

He surrounded himself with six dozen of the unyeilding fearsome deities of storm and battle, each more powerful than the Gods in Svarga. The stories that grew around them showed that they truly were followers of the great Rudra.

Once Gotama the great sage was very thirsty and asked the Maruts for some water. The Maruts took a whole well to him and poured the water into a pot at his hermitage.

Indra's relationship with the Maruts was...complicated.

They were prophesied to slay Indra and end his regime of Swarga before they were born. Indra went down to Earth to prevent their birth just as their mother was due. He fired his thunderbolt at the womb, which divided the embryo into twelve parts, all of whom started crying in great agony. He was unable to console them. Incensed at their obstinacy in crying, he cut each of these twelve parts, and thus formed sixty Maruts. Indra, relizing that he had just tried murdering sixty infants in delivery decided to take care of them as his brothers instead.

Indra's guardianship guaranteed them all the avails of the Svarga and the associated powers. Rudra's mentorship and guidance honed their obstinacy. In the land of the fierce one, they were the fiercest ones.