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Oathbringer Prologue (spoilers)


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30 minutes ago, BlackYeti said:

That's not what is meant here according to this WoP:

In future, please try not to state speculation as fact: there are people who will assume that it's actually been confirmed. :)

Thanks for posting this. I didn't realize Peter had done some clarification on that quote.

I've always suspected that the use of the word "bridge" in that Diagram segment, was a hint that Shen/Rlain is the Parshendi Mr.T should be worried about. What with Rlain having such a strong connection to Kaladin and the men of Bridge 4, some of whom seem to be turning into Windrunner squires. Perhaps in the future, Rlain will be able to "obtain their power" as well.

 

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Also what about Syl telling Kaladin that Parsendai can't bond with spren?? riddle me that batman. Also I shouldn't have to say it! that this is just my opinion this is a forum to talk about theories after all. 

t

Edited by Humpty
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maybe it's more in the spirit of "no spren would bond with a parshendi after what happened..."

my thought is that the parshendi were not only less suitable for the nahel bond than humans (being less able to give spren access to the physical), but also that the spren 'betrayal' of the parshendi was because the spren were corrupted by odium and turned the parshendi into odium-susceptible power forms. In result, the radiant spren vowed never to bond with parshendi again.

if no spren would take them, then the parshendi can't bond.

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1 hour ago, Darkness said:

maybe it's more in the spirit of "no spren would bond with a parshendi after what happened..."

my thought is that the parshendi were not only less suitable for the nahel bond than humans (being less able to give spren access to the physical), but also that the spren 'betrayal' of the parshendi was because the spren were corrupted by odium and turned the parshendi into odium-susceptible power forms. In result, the radiant spren vowed never to bond with parshendi again.

if no spren would take them, then the parshendi can't bond.

This is exactly what I was thinking, though you said it better than I could. It's not impossible - just unprecedented. 

 

From a 2014 signing:
Question: Can a Parshendi bond a KR spren?
BRANDON SANDERSON: Historically, the Parshendi were not made Knights Radiant, or the parshmen weren't.

Question: Can they become squires maybe?
BRANDON SANDERSON: Historically they did not, but it's not impossible.

 

Also, the Listener Songs:
40th stanza of the Listener Song of Secrets - 
The betrayal of spren has brought us here.
They gave their Surges to human heirs,

But not to those who know them most dear, before us.

9th & 10th stanzas of the Listener Song of Spren - 
The spren betrayed us, it’s often felt.
Our minds are too close to their realm
That gives us our forms, but more is then
Demanded by the smartest spren,
We can’t provide what the humans lend,
Though broth are we, their meat is men

But it is not impossible to blend
Their Surges to ours in the end.
It has been promised and it can come.

Or do we understand the sum?
We question not if they can have us then,
But if we dare to have them again

 

 

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55 minutes ago, Soulcatcher said:

This is exactly what I was thinking, though you said it better than I could. It's not impossible - just unprecedented. 

 

From a 2014 signing:
Question: Can a Parshendi bond a KR spren?
BRANDON SANDERSON: Historically, the Parshendi were not made Knights Radiant, or the parshmen weren't.

Question: Can they become squires maybe?
BRANDON SANDERSON: Historically they did not, but it's not impossible.

 

Also, the Listener Songs:
40th stanza of the Listener Song of Secrets - 
The betrayal of spren has brought us here.
They gave their Surges to human heirs,

But not to those who know them most dear, before us.

9th & 10th stanzas of the Listener Song of Spren - 
The spren betrayed us, it’s often felt.
Our minds are too close to their realm
That gives us our forms, but more is then
Demanded by the smartest spren,
We can’t provide what the humans lend,
Though broth are we, their meat is men

But it is not impossible to blend
Their Surges to ours in the end.
It has been promised and it can come.

Or do we understand the sum?
We question not if they can have us then,
But if we dare to have them again

 

 

Good references!

I've suspected (from many discussions) that the Parshendi were designed to bond with Adonalsium spren, that Odium then hijacked that to make them instead bond with voidspren (add they weren't originally of Odium or Cultivation, but now are) and that the way to stop the Desolations is to make them now be of Honor and enable bonding with Nahel bond spren. So I think they can't, but need to.

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13 hours ago, Soulcatcher said:

Thanks for posting this. I didn't realize Peter had done some clarification on that quote.

I've always suspected that the use of the word "bridge" in that Diagram segment, was a hint that Shen/Rlain is the Parshendi Mr.T should be worried about. What with Rlain having such a strong connection to Kaladin and the men of Bridge 4, some of whom seem to be turning into Windrunner squires. Perhaps in the future, Rlain will be able to "obtain their power" as well.

 

Great minds think alike. :D i´ve posted the same thing in another thread.

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On 2/12/2017 at 8:20 PM, cometaryorbit said:

And Gavilar wanted to get the Parshendi involved for this, so it sounds like if his plan had worked, Alethkar would be much better shape to deal with the Desolation than they actually are now that it's happened.

 

My reading of this is that Gavilar wanted to turn Parshendi into Voidbringers and fight them,  NOT fight alongside them.

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On 11.2.2017 at 9:14 PM, geoffw35 said:

Some poster mentioned (maybe not in this thread, I don't remember) the possibility that the shards that we've seen called the corpses of spren might possibly be re-enlivened, so that the spren could bond with another person. Do many of you believe this is a real possibility? It assumes, I think, that those who now own the shard blades would be the type who would want to do this and be acceptable. Or, alternatively, that some group might take it upon themselves to start killing shard bearers and collecting them for the purpose of giving them to those worthy of the bond associated with the spren of that shard.

I don't know whether many believe it a real possibility, I for sure do. Hints to this end I see in Adolin talking to his shardblade and perhaps getting some feelings back from it. Since that blade is an Edgedancer blade (if I recall correctly) and I cannot see Adolin fitting to be an Edgedancer, this combination probably won't work to revive the blade, though.  This blade is an Edgedancer blade and Maxal's post in following thread (too long to quote here) has persuaded me, that Adolin shows many traits similar to Lift, so he might bond his shardblade and revive it.

And spren don't die in a human sense.  As Syl said, humans are odd. A broken spren is still a spren. What happens if the "owner" of that broken spren starts to think of it as something alive? As a cognitive entity, the spren might become alive again after it has been thought of as "alive" for a sufficent long time. Talking to something might be a path to that end.

I have in mind little children talking to their teddies and imagining them as alive. When I was a kid, I guess about 4 years old, I started cutting the fur of my teddy, because I was sure it grew back - didn't work with the teddy, perhaps I would have had more luck with a spren ;-)

My thoughts towards Gavilar: My first reaction was "What a JERK!!! Kill him!", contemplating a bit more, this prologue cries "RED HERRING!!!". No more time to elaborate now, but the general discussion already includes many of my thoughts. Just one item: Gavilar (or the people really pulling the strings) probably had backup plans in case something went wrong (like the highly improbable assassination of the king).

Some elaborating now: We got an early version of the prologue of book 3 in a 10 book series. Even if we consider arc one, the first 5 books only, we are just in the middle of that arc. In my opinion this is far to early for Brandon to put all cards onto the table. Gavilars motives don't look good here, combined with Amaram's snippets from WoR, assuming their goals coalign, they stem from religious fervor. The Vorin ultras want their gods back, so they have to be lured out of hiding. But what is behind this? I feel we are missing another layer of sceming - that of Cultivation. We know from Dalinars visions, that Cultivation was much better in seeing the future than Honor was, giving her some powerful means of sceming.

Spoiler

Compare with Preservations convoluted plots to defeat Ruin, being so complex that in the endgame Leras/Preservation couldn't grasp them anymore and had to rely on his former ingenuity. Preservation was/is also good at seeing into the future.

Wyndle calls the Nightwatcher his mother. Syl calls the Stormfather her father. In analogy to the Stormfather, the Nightwatcher should be Cultivation's mind (not Cognitive Shadow, since Cultivation still lives, as far as we know).  We know that many people go to the Nightwatcher to get their boon and curse, which gives Cultivation a great means to influence things on Roshar. Taravangians Diagram could be her plan from the beginning (not necessarily the resulting consequences). Question is: Was Gavilar also in the Valley, visiting the Nightwatcher? Probably not as an orthodox vorinist.

None the less, the Diagram says the desolation needs no usher. I think this is true. The appearance of the desolation depends - in my reasoning - on the breaking of Taln. As soon as Taln breaks and leaves Braize, the Desolation will come. The resulting everstorm, which is a new phenomenon, might be caused by Gavilars scheming - but not the Desolation itself. His ushering might even have positive effects in the end - if the Heralds are lured out of hiding by it and become sane again somehow.

Edited by Pattern
Elaborating a bit more
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On 2/18/2017 at 4:13 AM, Pattern said:

I don't know whether many believe it a real possibility, I for sure do. Hints to this end I see in Adolin talking to his shardblade and perhaps getting some feelings back from it. Since that blade is an Edgedancer blade (if I recall correctly) and I cannot see Adolin fitting to be an Edgedancer, this combination probably won't work to revive the blade, though.  This blade is an Edgedancer blade and Maxal's post in following thread (too long to quote here) has persuaded me, that Adolin shows many traits similar to Lift, so he might bond his shardblade and revive it.

And spren don't die in a human sense.  As Syl said, humans are odd. A broken spren is still a spren. What happens if the "owner" of that broken spren starts to think of it as something alive? As a cognitive entity, the spren might become alive again after it has been thought of as "alive" for a sufficent long time. Talking to something might be a path to that end.

I have in mind little children talking to their teddies and imagining them as alive. When I was a kid, I guess about 4 years old, I started cutting the fur of my teddy, because I was sure it grew back - didn't work with the teddy, perhaps I would have had more luck with a spren ;-)

Interesting. I read your initial post, but I missed the edit. At first, I thought this wasn't the right time and place to launch myself into lengthy explanations, so I am glad you fished out one of my old posts and even more glad it managed to convince you. I have to apologize about my terrible grammar, someday, I'll improve. I made a better one in "I don't remember which thread" where I address the most common reasons why people dislike the Edgedancer theory.

Love the Terry bear analogy.... I am now picturing little Adolin talking endlessly to his toy Shardblade only to grow more talkative when he gets an upgrade to a real one, much like the real-life kid who ends up getting a real-life pony.

For the rest, I am currently enjoying hating Gavilar way too much to change my perspective on him just yet. It is obvious we do not have all the cards in hand and while it is possible he'll come across as a long-lost hero (though I sincerely doubt it having read the Oathbringer's first four flashback chapters), I still do not believe his motives are entirely pure.

I also doubt Gavilar was in the valley visiting the Nightwatcher at the same time as Dalinar. Dalinar implied he was supposed to watch over Elhokar, but decided to leave him alone in order to make a "personal trip". He and Gavilar thus couldn't have been together at the time.

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@maxal, did you just spoiler Oathbringer flashbacks?

9 hours ago, LIL BILL said:

Theres a reddit post where someone transcribes it, and later in the comments, someone shares a screen capture of an email from Brandon giving permission to do so.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Stormlight_Archive/comments/5saeg6/oathbringer_prologue_read_by_brandon_at_signing/

We know. We made use of that transcript few pages back.

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11 hours ago, Oversleep said:

@maxal, did you just spoiler Oathbringer flashbacks?

No... I didn't. Nothing of what I said comes from those. The bout about Elhokar is from WoR and it is the most common assumption, though not exactly confirmed. I should have clarified it. All I said with respect to those flashbacks is they didn't change my perspective on Gavilar, so far which isn't really a spoiler: other people will have a very different perspective.

 

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Actually I only had in mind the possibilty of Gavilar visiting the Nightwatcher on his own, not together with Dalinar. But as I wrote before, that is unlikely because Gavilar is even more orthodox Vorin than Dalinar.

I really don't like Gavilar at the moment. Still he is influenced by his visions and probably by something else,

Spoiler

assuming he also feels the Thrill (caused by Nergaoul - Unmade - splinter of Odium?)

easily making him a puppet orchestrated by at least two shards so I am hesitant to judge him, yet.

I am prepared for another twist...

So, while we all discussed Gavilar and other stuff, I think there is another tidbit of information, we should consider:

On 6.2.2017 at 8:41 PM, jofwu said:

“It’s what’s called a fabrial, a device powered by Stormlight that does something handy. This one makes warmth, just a smidge unfortunately, but my wife’s confident the scholars can create one that would heat an entire room. Wouldn’t that be wonderful? No more fires and hearths.”

It seemed lifeless to Eshonai, but she didn’t say so. She hummed to praise, so he wouldn’t keep telling her of this, and handed it back.

“Look closely,” King Gavilar said. “Look deep into it. Can you see what’s moving inside? That’s a spren. That’s how the device works.”

Captive, like in a gemheart, she thought, attuning awe. They built a device to mimic how they applied their forms. [They invested? so much of their limitations?].

Here we get another confirmation that fabrials work by capturing/enslaving spren. The analogy to a spren in a gemheart though, is breathtaking:

1.: Parshendi have gemhearts (not only greatshells).

2.: Parshendi apply their forms by capturing a spren (opposed to bonding a spren).

Now one can speculate whether greatshells also form their symbiosis with spren via capturing them in their gemhearts or if there is another mechanism. The next question contains minor spoilers from "The Thrill", so I put it in Spoiler tags.

Spoiler

Do Ryshadium also have gemhearts or do they form another kind of bond with their music spren? Since the music spren are seen flying behind the galopping Ryshaium, I would strongly assume there is another kind of bond, perhaps similar to the Nahel bond between humans and spren, which makes sense insofar as Ryshadium are a variety of horses and probably are not native to Roshar. (Ryshadium are special to and can only be found on Roshar, but I think the horses came to Roshar together with the first humans and some developed further into Ryshadium by bonding spren).

 

Edited by Pattern
Change of topic, edit to prevent double post
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On 2/6/2017 at 11:37 PM, RyanEl said:

Also, we now know Eshonai had one black sphere, so where did it go? I'm guessing Venli found it and was influenced in some way, eventually using it to reverse engineer stormform. This is just speculation of course since I think it's one logical leap too many, but if true, Gavilar did inadvertently succeed in his goal of bringing about the Everstorm.

I definitely agree. This brought to mind the WoK interlude with Geranid and Ashir, where measuring and recording spren characteristics locked them into those values. In the first Eshonai interlude of WoR, she notes that since the assassination of Gavilar, Venli has created a script and uses a lot of resources so that they can have paper. The nimbleform scholars have been "capturing" the old songs on the pages. I wonder if there is something about the spren in the sphere (and maybe the songs) that Venli was able to measure and record to force the spren used in stormform into the characteristics that facilitate the transformation.

Quote

Belief has had a lot to do with the cosmere. (for example in Warbreaker. The appearances of the Returned had a lot to do with belief) Will belief have a big part to play in The Stormlight Archive?

BRANDON SANDERSON

It already has. The two scholars measuring the spren.
 
Do you think that belief has some part in the Parshendi forms?
Is what the stormwardens do measuring, predicting and recording the high storm related, especially to how Gavilar got the voidlight sphere in the first place?
Is there something about Szeth's belief that the voidbringers were returning that might have the power to lock it into place? Clap if you believe...
 
I don't have any solid ideas but all this was floating around in my head so I thought I would get it out there and see if anyone else could connect some dots.
Edited by LeahAstonished
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