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Dalinar's Shoulder


teknopathetic

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During the end of WoR, a medical professional in Dalinar's army inspects Dalinar's newest shoulder wound. The doctor is horrified to see that the skin is mostly scar. Dalinar seems to have suffered an incongruently large number of wounds to his shoulder (and likely other body parts).

The doctor says that Dalinar shouldn't be able to fight at all considering the previous trauma that the shoulder has suffered. Danilar should never have recovered full from his previous wounds. Dalinar jokes off the remark, but the doctor insists that the human body can't function normally after receiving wounds like his....

“Storms” the surgeon said, “Highprince, you’re all scars under here. How many time have you been wounded in the shoulder”

“Can’t Remember”

“How can you still use your arm?”

“Training and practice”

“that’s not how it works…” she whispered eyes wider “I mean… Storms…”

---

Do we think Dalinar has previously drawn in stormlight? Has he been a base-level Radiant for a lot longer than we thought? Dalinar took multiple arrows to the shoulder in his newly released flashback chapters. It seems as if Dalinar never stopped being the Blackthorn due to injury, though? The Blackthorn doesn't sound like a great candidate for a Nahel-bond so it doesn't make a lot of sense to say he was healing with Stormlight?

Perhaps Shardeplate has regenerative qualities? Perhaps the gems can slowly leach into the body? Shardplate is so rare that perhaps medics haven't had the opportunity to study its effects on healing. 

Another option is that The Thrill might grant impressive regenerative properties (we know that it can energize and invigorate), but you'd think the medic would be aware of such a phenomena associated with The Thrill. Perhaps Daninar's Thrill was something so beastly that he was able to tap into Odium's investiture?

My other thought is that perhaps his body was healed by The Nightwatcher. This seems unlikely since Dalinar has sustained multiple wounds to his body over the course of decades. It seems unlikely that Dalinar visited the Nightwatcher so early in his life (though we can't be sure just yet).

 

What do you guys think? How has Dalinar managed to heal from the wounds he sustained in his youth?

 

Edited by teknopathetic
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We know Dalinar has drawn in Stormlight in the past

Quote

In response to the question, Dalinar took a sphere from his pocket and held it up. Then he sucked in the Stormlight.

He knew to expect the feeling of a storm raging inside, as both Kaladin and Shallan had described it to him. It urged him to act, to move, to not stand still. It did not, however, feel like the Thrill of battle—which was what he had anticipated.He felt his wounds healing in a familiar way. He’d done this before, he sensed. On the battlefield earlier? His arm felt fine now, and the cut on his side barely ached anymore.

But that doesn't sound like something that has happened that often, or he would have recognised the feeling.

And more importantly, if it was Stormlight, he wouldn't be so badly scarred. It doesn't just preserve your ability to fight, it actually heals the damage. 

I like the idea of the Thrill being related, but as you say, Alethi medics would be familiar with it. 

The Nightwatcher seems like the best idea. I'm thinking that, much like Taravangian asked for "capacity", Dalinar asked to "endure". He was able to endure his wife's death by forgetting her, and he's been able to endure all of his injuries without ever being stopped. In fact, "enduring" seems to sum up Dalinar.

Of course, that doesn't fit the usual pattern of the Nightwatcher, where the curse and the boon are distinct. But that seems to be the same for Taravangian, who seems to have his curse and boon entwined.

 

Edited by Tarion
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21 minutes ago, teknopathetic said:

During the end of WoR, a medical professional in Dalinar's army inspects Dalinar's newest shoulder wound. The doctor is horrified to see that the skin in mostly scar. Dalinar seems to have suffered an incongruently large number of wounds to his shoulder (and likely other body parts).

The doctor says that Dalinar shouldn't be able to fight at all considering the previous trauma that the shoulder has suffered. Danilar should never have recovered full from his previous wounds. Dalinar jokes off the remark, but the doctor insists that the human body can't function normally after receiving wounds like his....

---

Do we think Dalinar has previously drawn in stormlight? Has he been a base-level Radiant for a lot longer than we thought?

Another option is that The Thrill can grant impressive regenerative properties (we know that it can energize and invigorate), but you'd think the medic would be aware of such a phenomena associated with The Thrill. Perhaps Daninar's Thrill was something so beastly that he was able to tap into Odium's investiture?

My other thought is that perhaps his body was healed by The Nightwatcher. This seems unlikely since Dalinar has sustained multiple wounds to his body of the corse of decades. 

 

What do you guys think? How has Dalinar managed to heal from the wounds he sustained in his youth?

 

If Dalinar had been drawing in stormlight when he was gravely wounded in the past, he probably would have healed well enough to not leave gruesome scars.

To your other point, I could definitely see a younger, more blood-thirsty Dalinar asking the Nightwatcher to restore his ability to fight as his boon if his accumulated decades worth of injuries had begun to slow him down...I've heard people suggest he may have asked the Nightwatcher for combat related boons before, but none of them ever seemed to me to be in line with the nature of his character...until now of course.  Have an upvote for originality and what I consider to be a simple yet compelling theory.

I'm less confident about the Thrill and the Odium stuff, but I do suppose it seems plausible; it's hard to distinguish from the text if the Thrill is all mental/emotional, or if it actually has some manner of physiological component to it.  IE: is it operating at the level of the Cognitive Realm, or is it literally affecting soldier's physical selves?

EDIT: Darn...Ninja'd...

Edited by hwiles
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Cosmere healing does not leave scars - Feruchemical gold / Stormlight just heal the thing.

Dalinar could have only inhaled Stormlight with his bond with Stormfather - so, the timetable is beginning of visions or perhaps later than that when he first had problems with the Thrill (as Radiants do not feel it).

I'd be suspiscious of Shardplate; it does grant similar enhancements as holding Stormlight. Perhaps it also enhances healing capacity (not so drastic as truly holding Stormlight since Shardbearers do get wounded and there are no records of miraculous healing).

Another theory (which I subscribe to) is that simply Dalinar did heal his injuries (as in - the old injuries) with Stormlight but the scars were not healed as they're part of his Cognitive self (see Kaladin's brands - he did heal the tatoo but not the scars).

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42 minutes ago, Oversleep said:

Another theory (which I subscribe to) is that simply Dalinar did heal his injuries (as in - the old injuries) with Stormlight but the scars were not healed as they're part of his Cognitive self (see Kaladin's brands - he did heal the tatoo but not the scars).

^ This

Dalinar expected there to be scars, so there are. He might be able to get rid of them with proper "mental gymnastics"

Edited by Green Hoodie Mistborn
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38 minutes ago, Oversleep said:

Another theory (which I subscribe to) is that simply Dalinar did heal his injuries (as in - the old injuries) with Stormlight but the scars were not healed as they're part of his Cognitive self (see Kaladin's brands - he did heal the tatoo but not the scars).

I'm not sure this actually fits with how the human body works though. Scar tissue is part of what inhibits your movement, so with Stormlight healing, he'd get back to his maximum potential quicker, but as long as he still had the scars that maximum potential would be significantly decreased. That doesn't fit with the relatively healthy Dalinar that we see in WoK/WoR. 

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1 hour ago, Tarion said:

We know Dalinar has drawn in Stormlight in the past

And more importantly, if it was Stormlight, he wouldn't be so badly scarred. It doesn't just preserve your ability to fight, it actually heals the damage. 

Not entirely.  I seem to recall a WoB that stated stormlight ( and gold ) healing only healed as you expected it to, or some such.  Witness Kaladin's brands that haven't been healed.  

 

So it's entirely possible he has surface scarring because that's what he expects to have.

 

EDIT: damnation, ninja'd

Edited by grasshoppa
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1 minute ago, Tarion said:

I'm not sure this actually fits with how the human body works though. Scar tissue is part of what inhibits your movement...

It never says his shoulder is full of scar tissue. Just that there are external scars present all over his shoulder.

I'm sure that his underlying shoulder is perfectly healthy, it just has the scar lines on the outer skin layers. 

His doctor makes the same assumption about underlying scar tissue inhibiting his mobility too in that scene, but given his lack of inhibited motion, the assumption has to be external scarring only based on his Cognitive expectations.

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Just now, Green Hoodie Mistborn said:

It never says his shoulder is full of scar tissue. Just that there are external scars present all over his shoulder.

I'm sure that his underlying shoulder is perfectly healthy, it just has the scar lines on the outer skin layers. 

His doctor makes the same assumption about underlying scar tissue inhibiting his mobility too in that scene, but given his lack of inhibited motion, the assumption has to be external scarring only based on his Cognitive expectations.

That's possible, I imagine, but even just having external scarring would restrict his movement. That would also mean that he's been drawing in Stormlight since he was first injured, otherwise his shoulder would have locked up from the scars until he was able to Invest. Which says interesting things about his relationship with the Stormfather.

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Another possibility is Rashadium Horses. They do seem to bond with their Rider. Perhaps they allow an individual to absorb a small amount of investiture (enough to heal the body a bit but not enough to completely override the expectation of scars).  

Edited by teknopathetic
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On ‎2‎/‎13‎/‎2017 at 8:52 AM, Oversleep said:

Cosmere healing does not leave scars - Feruchemical gold / Stormlight just heal the thing.

Although not always that simple, black & white.   I.e. Kaladin's slave scar on his forehead.   Kaladin seemingly has been healing himself a long time.  But not his scar, because he thinks it should be there.  Perhaps Dalinar is the same - he been unconsciously healing himself; except for things he thinks should be there (like battle scares)?

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2 hours ago, djammmer said:

Although not always that simple, black & white.   I.e. Kaladin's slave scar on his forehead.   Kaladin seemingly has been healing himself a long time.  But not his scar, because he thinks it should be there.  Perhaps Dalinar is the same - he been unconsciously healing himself; except for things he thinks should be there (like battle scares)?

I meant that any wound healed with Stormlight/Feruchemical gold does not leave scars; later in my post I talk about healing old injuries and I do make distinction between them.

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It's worth noting that if Dalinar was only pulling in small amounts of Stormlight, it's possible it'd heal the worst of the damage but still leave visible or prominent scars on the outside. Then we'd have exactly the observed phenomenon. 

Depending, of course, how Stormlight healing works...like if it's worst-first, least-first or a sort of general boost. But I was kinda of thinking about how Sazed heals in WoA where he's alive but not entirely whole. 

The biggest issue with this is timing, even being generous and assuming that Dalinar gained the ability to draw in some quantity of Stormlight on the day Gaviliar died (which seems a stretch) there's still decades of warmongerin' and injuries to account for. It's possible some amount of the injuries were on the shattered plain, but I don't think they all were. 

 

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After Dalinar bonds the Stormfather, Kaladin is suprised how easily Dalinar absorbed gemlight. Kaladin said it took him a week, but Dalinar says " i had a teacher" or something like that (implying Kaladin's example helped). This could be because Dalinar had an example, or something to do with Bondsmiths, or Dalinar has been absorbing light for a lot longer than we thought. 

 

After bonding with the stormfather, Dalinar also thinks something like "I must have been absorbing some light furing the battle, considering my wounds". It seems like Dalinar was absorning light BEFORE he met with the Stormfather? How? It dorsn't seem like the Stormfather was trying to assist Dalinar in anyway before the words were spoken. I suppose the visions could have been enough to allow a partial bond to form. 

 

Is the spiritweb crack itself enough to let in light? 

Edited by teknopathetic
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At the end of words of radiance didn't he say the second bondsmith ideal. The first ideal being life before death ect. The visions being a part of their bond. I'm not sure how long he's had the visions but he's been reading way of kings for a while. The stormfather didn't seem very happy with to be bonded so he kept his role hidden but dalinar was still able to draw stormlight. How long that's been going on y'all probably know better then I do. 

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Revelation/Thought - we know he's been reading the way of kings for a long time. 

There is this:

Quote

Life before death. What was that voice?

Sanderson, Brandon. The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, Book 1) (p. 381). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

He is hearing a voice speaking the First Ideal to him a little over 1/3rd of the way into WoK, at a point where the killing in a battle is sickening him and he's trying to summon the Thrill

My guess is, he has spoken the words well before. Maybe even years ago when Gavilar was "studying tWoK", maybe shortly thereafter, when he changed his ways and started "reading" it for himself. Eitherway, my guess is that potential Bondsmiths when they speak those words, start their bonding of the Stormfather, which is the vehicle that allows them to receive the visions in the first place. Only potential Bondsmiths can receive the visions is my thought right now. 

Any previous healing... probably from the Thrill, maybe the Thrill also gives access to Stormlight. It's probably a type of Nahel bond with the corrupt Unmade spren. If that is the case, it would explain why the feeling is familiar, even before his staring to form a Nahel bond. 

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20 hours ago, Oversleep said:

I meant that any wound healed with Stormlight/Feruchemical gold does not leave scars; later in my post I talk about healing old injuries and I do make distinction between them.

Sure. What I was calling out - is that it is less about healing old injuries; and more my hypothesis that proto-radiants seem to not accidently heal things they subconsciously think should/could not be healed (kalidan's slave scar, Dalinar's battle scars -which he probably thinks of as trophies that were earned.)  I bet as full radiants they could consciously heal them if they wanted to.  They just currently have mental blocks subconsciously - because they identify who they are with those scars; and so are not accidently subconsciously auto-healing them.

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As we found out in edgedancer 

Spoiler

Wyndle becomes a shardstick when lift comes to realise the next oath without speaking it 

 

Mayhaps Dalina has become a proto radiant by living the first oath/ideal without speaking it

 

Edited by stonedshaman
figuring out how spoiler tags work
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My bet is on Shardplate!

On 2/13/2017 at 10:52 AM, Oversleep said:

Cosmere healing does not leave scars - Feruchemical gold / Stormlight just heal the thing.

Dalinar could have only inhaled Stormlight with his bond with Stormfather - so, the timetable is beginning of visions or perhaps later than that when he first had problems with the Thrill (as Radiants do not feel it).

I'd be suspiscious of Shardplate; it does grant similar enhancements as holding Stormlight. Perhaps it also enhances healing capacity (not so drastic as truly holding Stormlight since Shardbearers do get wounded and there are no records of miraculous healing).

Another theory (which I subscribe to) is that simply Dalinar did heal his injuries (as in - the old injuries) with Stormlight but the scars were not healed as they're part of his Cognitive self (see Kaladin's brands - he did heal the tatoo but not the scars).

Shardplate initially ran off a Radiant's Stormlight, then fabrials were added so a non-Surgebinder could gain the benefits via Stormlight in gems.

It is possible that this artificial connection to Stormlight could also have healing effects (in very small effectiveness).

Dalinar is a rare case in terms of the length of time he has worn Shardplate, which is a "likely" cause why the surgeon is surprised by any extrodinary recovery 

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2 hours ago, Avandar said:

Let's not forget that at the time he was bonded to an Honor blade, that would have healed him from current injuries, just like Szeth is healed with whichever honor blade he was using

WoR spoilers

Spoiler

Dalinar has never bonded a Honorblade, Taln's blade was switched out before it arrived at the camp. This can be noticed from the fact that the blade screamed after Dalinar bonded the Stormfather, and that the descriptions of Taln's blade and Dalinar's blade are different:
WoK:

Quote

His muscles glistened, wet as if he’d just swum a great distance. To his side, he carried a massive Shardblade, point down, sticking about a finger’s width into the stone, his hand on the hilt. The Blade reflected torchlight; it was long, narrow, and straight, shaped like an enormous spike.

WoR:

Quote

White mist coalesced in Dalinar’s fingers, and a Shardblade appeared, tip to Amaram’s throat. Wider than most, it was almost cleaverlike in appearance.

 

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5 hours ago, DocHoliday said:

Does no-one remember Dalinar glowing when he saved Elhokar from the Chasmfiend? He displayed strength beyond what Shardplate provides, and were still debating wether or not he's drawn in Stormlight?:huh:

I don't think anyone is debating whether or not he's drawn in and used it before really.

The question is really by what mechanism has he been using Stormlight? And, how long has he been able to do so?

Did he have one method and now has switched over to another? Did he start a proto-bond with the Stormfather when he rearranged his life to live by the codes? Did he get a proto-bond with the Stormfather after he started reading/reciting language from the Way of Kings (in world book)? Is the Thrill like a mini-Nahel bond with an unmade that allows the user to draw on Stormlight? Is/was/has he been pulling Stormlight from the spheres embedded in his Shardplate? All of the above perhaps? 

I like the idea that the Thrill gives some small ability to use stormlight, but that when he rearranged his life, he started a proto-bond with the Stormfather. That bond has allowed him to use unconsciously small amounts of Stormlight, but also is the vehicle by which the Visions were delivered. And now it's a full bond, so he's doing the drawing in of Stormlight consciously. 

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