Short Story: Worms of the Earth

Overview
"Worms of the Earth" follows Bran Mak Morn, the brooding last king of the Picts, as he turns to forbidden sorcery to avenge wrongs inflicted by a Roman official. The story blends historical dark fantasy with visceral horror, trading heroic triumph for a grim, morally ambiguous victory. Its atmosphere is dank and claustrophobic, driven by a sense that ancient, slumbering things beneath the earth answer only to the most desperate of bargains.
Howard frames Bran as a tragic, noble figure whose hatred and pride push him toward methods his people would shun. Rather than lead an army, Bran seeks occult means, contacting subterranean, inhuman remnants of a pre-human race that are loathsome, powerful, and utterly alien. The narrative moves from the cold forces of imperial Rome into the stinking caverns of a forgotten world, where the cost of vengeance becomes the central horror.

Story summary
Bran is driven by personal enmity against a Roman magistrate whose cruelty and insult have made continued resistance pointless through ordinary means. Unable to face Rome directly with the forces he commands, Bran learns of a witch and an outcast who know the rites that can summon the "worms", degenerate, inhuman beings that dwell underground and subsist on a hatred older than recorded history. He bargains with these grotesque creatures, invoking rites that require degradation, blood, and an unspoken surrender of dignity.
The summoned horrors rise from their subterranean lairs to strike at the Roman, accomplishing Bran's revenge but not without leaving marks on the king himself. The victory is immediate and complete: the Roman is destroyed in a nightmarish, almost apocalyptic way. Yet Bran returns to his people changed. The narrative dwells on the sensory detail of the creatures and the nauseating rites, making the reader feel the moral and physical contamination Bran accepts. The story closes with a lingering sense of bleak triumph; Bran achieves his aim, but the cost, both personal and cultural, is stark and irreversible.

Themes and tone
Howard explores vengeance as a corrosive force: the desire to strike back can lead even a noble soul to embrace what he most hates. The subterranean beings embody atavism, the idea that beneath civilized façades lie older, degenerate impulses that can be awakened. The horror is not merely physical but ethical, the decay of honor and the price of using darkness to fight darkness. Howard's prose emphasizes sensory revulsion, stench, slime, and the cold touch of the earth, conveying horror through bodily detail rather than abstract terror.
The tone is tragic and fatalistic. Bran is no swaggering hero; he is a king who knows his people are doomed by history and cruelty, and who accepts exile into shame to achieve a single, devastating act. The story marries historical setting with supernatural dread, making the ancient world feel plausibly grim while introducing fantastical terrors whose roots seem older than humanity.

Legacy and influence
"Worms of the Earth" stands among Howard's most memorable tales for its synthesis of sword-and-sorcery elements with pure horror. It helped define Bran Mak Morn as a complex, tragic figure in Howard's canon and influenced later writers who blended historical fantasy with cosmic or body horror. The story's willingness to portray revenge as morally ambiguous and its vivid, lurid imagery have kept it a touchstone for readers and authors interested in dark fantasy that refuses easy consolation.