Worm

"'The Worms have always been eager to inhabit us. Here are the practices which make us inhospitable to them.' There are diagrams. The diagrams are not good to look upon, and none of the practices they depict would allow the subject to survive."

- The Tantra of Worms

A Worm is an eldritch, parasitic creature of immense power that originated from Nowhere, where they bred in the corpse of The Sun-in-Splendour. They represent an existential threat not merely to the mortal world, but to the Mansus as well, and if they are ever able to complete their work the Mansus itself will become Nowhere. Worms are described as "smooth and dark as jewels", and more visible in dreams than in the waking world. Even the toxic remnants of Worms are said to be "rank with the power that inhabits dead Hours".

It is said that the Aspects of and  most closely resemble Worms, and thus understand their weaknesses, but relying on them is not a practical countermeasure. Moth and are equally effective at dispelling a certain Curse that attracts Worms, and a mortal who has become infested by Worms can still be saved in the early stages through use of the  Influence "An Imminence". Black Elie, Damascene Matriarch of the Sisterhood of the Knot, recorded a number of protective incantations allegedly capable of protecting the world against the Worms provided they be renewed every four years, but her work was entombed with her and it is likely the incantations have not been performed in at least a thousand years.

The first known mention of Worms is in Commandments For the Preservation of All That Exists, in the reign of Didius Julianus (historically 193 AD). Later, after the Intercalate, they multiplied in the Sun's corpse. There have been three Worm Wars: the First in the 1500s, the Second in the 1700s, and the Third too recent to have passed into the Histories. After being routed in the First Worm War, the Worms learned how to inhabit and control humans, a skill which made them unstoppable in the Second Worm War in the Third History; the Worms won that conflict handily, overrunning Europe and most notably taking Vienna. The Hours can best the Worms in combat, and The Lionsmith has strength enough to crush a Worm singlehandedly, but even the Hours view the Worms with caution and revulsion. Mortals have almost no practical way to battle Worms.

A number of Worms are kept in The Worm Museum, a kind of prison in the Mansus that is both part of it and separate. The Colonel is tasked with guarding The Worm Museum, and even the Lionsmith declines to challenge him there despite their long rivalry. Within the structure, various specimens of Worms, "always dying, never dead", are on display: one of the Worms that took Vienna is kept alongside a Worm extracted from the soul of a child.

Claude Hersault, author of An Introduction to Histories, might imply that the 17th century magus and immortal Julian Coseley was subsumed by Worms, and refers to him as "a Worm of Worms", though it is not evident from Coseley's behavior that this was true. Hersault's usage of "Worm" here likely instead refers to a political group within the Obliviates that wishes to break the Hours' control over the world and dissolve the Mansus as a whole, with whom Coseley is associated.

Books

 * An Introduction to Histories
 * Commandments For the Preservation of All That Exists
 * The Humours of a Gentleman
 * The Tantra of Worms
 * The Viennese Conundra