The Harvestmen

Err not, young one. Listen to your priestess and your mothers and question not what they say, lest the Harvestmen come to harvest you.

Summary

Large, hulking shadow figures climb through the hive in the dusk hour, after everyone has gone to sleep. When the residents wake up, a woman had been whisked away during the night, never to be seen again. The next decade, a small larva taken. The reasoning? Disobedience.

Disobedience leads to being forever removed from the hive, never to be seen again, likely killed by the monsters called The Harvestmen. The priestesses say they are there to make sure Mirri's will is followed. Mothers teach their young to be mindlessly obedient from hatching to make sure they aren't whisked away.

Evidence

While few have ever seen them, they do actually exist, and abeil of the hives do go missing when disobedience is sensed. Eye witness accounts say they're ten times the size of a normal abeil and all-black with sprouts on the tops of their heads. They don't respond to any stimulus other than their target running away, and they're incredibly strong.

Tool for Fearmongering

The threat alone of being forcefully separated from family, friends, and home is usually enough to make children obedient, but it also works well for the adults that make their home in the hive. Religious leaders use the fear the Harvestmen bring to keep followers in line, and it works incredibly well.

Literature

Nursery rhymes and songs have been made for parents to sing to their children and poems recount artistically the times of invasion.

Art

Few tapestries depict the monstrosities, but they are often relegated to being hidden or small corners of a larger piece.

I saw one! I saw one! A Harvestman! He was tall, and wiry, and he came right for me! Thankfully it was just a dream, though, right? ...Right?

— A scared child

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Cold was the hall as I traversed southwards towards my room, and as I turned behind, there, with his red stare. He had come for me, surely, and I closed my eyes to wait for my demise. I waited, and the cold passed me by, so I opened mine eyes once more. He had left, gone into the room of my sister seamstresses, and vanished into the night.