Was Bent Nale Right? Does Surgebinding Bring on the Desolations?

[Confused]

Bent Nale frequently states his concern that surgebinding will bring on a Desolation. (For why I call him “Bent Nale,” read this post.) I’m certain he believes he’s right, and he may actually be right, at least as to the Heralds’ use of surgebinding. Here’s why:

 

Surgebinding uses Stormlight to manipulate the Surges. Surgebinding draws upon Roshar’s Surges and redirects them to achieve the surgebinder’s goals. While the Cosmere’s magic systems, including Roshar’s, adhere to the Law of Conservation of Mass/Energy (WoB), surgebinding temporarily weakens the Surges as they are being drawn upon.

 

In a recent post, I posited that the Roshar Surges themselves imprison Odium and that the Everstorm is designed to prevent Stormlight from reinvesting the Surges, ultimately freeing Odium. When the Heralds use excessive amounts of Stormlight to surgebind, the weakened Surges permit Odium to again exercise influence on Roshar through a Desolation.

 

Evidence:

1. WoB states that if the Heralds linger on Roshar after prevailing in one Desolation, another Desolation will begin. Hence, they must leave Roshar.
2. Honorblades require much higher amounts of Stormlight to surgebind than does the Nahel bond.
3. When the nine Heralds abandoned the Oathpact, they left their Honorblades behind.

 

So…the Heralds use their Honorblades to defeat Odium during each Desolation. The Honorblades suck up enormous amounts of Stormlight, with correspondingly large impact on the Surges. If the Heralds were to stay on Roshar following a Desolation and continue to surgebind (perhaps by helping humankind recover from its losses in people and material culture, pre-KR), they would further weaken the Surges, allowing another Desolation to begin. Thus, when the nine Heralds decided to stay on Roshar, they abandoned their Honorblades so this wouldn’t happen.

 

I’m not sure this analysis applies to the KR, because of the more efficient Stormlight usage from the Nahel bond. But since there are so many KR, it’s possible. And, as many have speculated, perhaps that is what caused the Recreance – the KR’s desire to avoid a new Desolation by relinquishing their ability to surgebind.

[kari-no-sugata]

Given that Nale/whatever clearly has a few screws loose I find it really hard to take anything he says literally.

 

On a related note, I have a relevant post here:

http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/8022-how-did-the-recreance-happen/page-2#entry136617

 

Where I basically suggest that by "Desolation" Nale/whatever doesn't mean The Desolation but a home-grown equivalent that is similarly destructive (because Radiants were fighting humans). Even Szeth is referred to as being like a Desolation in the same chapter!

 

Now that a real Desolation has come along with Voidbringers, I wonder what Nale will do now? Try to arrest the Voidbringers?

[Fifth of Daybreak]

Given that Nale/whatever clearly has a few screws loose I find it really hard to take anything he says literally.

 

On a related note, I have a relevant post here:

http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/8022-how-did-the-recreance-happen/page-2#entry136617

 

Where I basically suggest that by "Desolation" Nale/whatever doesn't mean The Desolation but a home-grown equivalent that is similarly destructive (because Radiants were fighting humans). Even Szeth is referred to as being like a Desolation in the same chapter!

 

Now that a real Desolation has come along with Voidbringers, I wonder what Nale will do now? Try to arrest the Voidbringers?

 

We have no definitive proof that Nalan is insane. 

 

As to the original post, I think that's a possibility, but given the translated epigraph from the diagram hinting of a secret breaking the KR, it doesn't seem to fit thematically with it. We have the WoR (in-world) excerpts that seem to state that it was a really dirty wicked nasty secret:

 

 

Now, as the Windrunners were engaged, arose the event which has hitherto been referenced: namely, that discovery of some wicked thing of eminence, though whether it be some rogueries among the Radiants' adherents or of some external origin, Avena would not suggest.

-From Word of Radiance, chapter 38, page 6

WoR Chapter 38 Silent storm. 

 

Also, we know that Nalan invests during the Lift chapter, and if he thought that this was the reason for the desolations, he wouldn't be doing any sort of surgebinding in order to not contribute to it. 

[Seloun]

I can't imagine that this is the full explanation since it doesn't really make sense why the Heralds would have to go somewhere to be tortured between Desolations. If it's really just a matter of not using surges, it's unclear why they can't just do the same solution of putting their Honorblades elsewhere. Also, it makes no sense to let other Surgebinders run around willy-nilly if they're aware of this issue from the beginning. There's no particular evidence that the Heralds persecuted Nahel bond wielders before the 'Last Desolation' (besides the KR formation, but that's not so much persecution as providing structure).

 

It seems like whatever caused Nale to start hunting Surgebinders has to be a development since the he abandons the Oathpact.

[Moogle]

It seems like whatever caused Nale to start hunting Surgebinders has to be a development since the he abandons the Oathpact.

 

It's possible Nale didn't find out that Surgebinders cause Desolations until after the Oathpact was abandoned.

[Stormcrown]

I'm really liking the theory that the Knights Radiant abandoned their oaths much like the Heralds abandoned the Oathpact.

 

Its a bit of a moral grey area, something I think Sanderson likes. Honor's spren is strongly against creating more nahel bonds, but Odium returning is inevitable. Something the few Spren have accepted. (Especially with the honorblades potentially in the hands of people like Szeth) Instead of lasting for a few more thousand years, they decide that humanity has to fight. Even if its a small change, its better to die out fighting than whimpering in fear.

 

And given that Rayse is trapped in the solar system, his focus can't stray away from Roshar forever.

 

Also, in this post, RShara talks about

 

If their actions lead them to be mentally unbalanced, or to be more hateful than honorable, then yes, I think they could then start to be influenced by Odium, but it wouldn't be directly related their ability to Surgebind.

 

-This might be why the oaths hold they way they do in the Nahel bond. Each order has its own goals, and certain paths along the way (Kaladin killing Amaram) it would allow them to be manipulated by Odium. The oaths are a safeguard against Odium, while obtaining certain goals.

 

 

Edited May 15, 2014 by Stormcrown

[Confused]

EMTrevor: The OP is really an effort to explain Nale's belief about what caused the Desolations and why the Heralds could not stay on Roshar following each Desolation. The operative word in my Recreance speculation was "perhaps." I don't necessarily buy that's the cause of the Recreance, just raising the possibility. I've previously posted that I believe the Recreance had something to do with the destruction of Stormseat, though maybe not in the way I suggested in that post (Skybreaker bombardment). I still think complicity in Stormseat's destruction is more likely a cause for the Recreance than that the KR believed surgebinding caused the Desolations.

 

And regarding Nale's "investiture" in the Lift Interlude, using Stormlight in its general way of building strength and speed, etc. is not surgebinding. That's all Nale did in that chapter.

 

Seloun: You make excellent points. Some responses:

1. During earlier Desolations, the Heralds did not consider abandoning the Oathpact. They still needed their Honorblades for future use. Although Honorblades are "given" (whatever that means), perhaps relinquishing their Honorblades might have broken the Heralds' connection with their Blades, or at least they feared it might.
2. It may have been part of the Oathpact that they leave Roshar after each Desolation, whether or not the reason was ever explained to them. Nale may have subsequently discovered the reason (or at least what he thought was the reason), as Moogle says.
3. Even if the Heralds knew the reason, they may not have wanted to tempt themselves by hanging around with their Honorblades.
4. The Heralds may not have cared about the KR surgebinding, either because they didn't then know about the issue (see paragraph 2) or because they thought that the problem only applied to their own surgebinding, given the Honorblades' greater consumption of Stormlight. "Bent" Nale may have gone after fledgling Nahel surgebinders precisely because he WAS "bent" (corrupted).
5. We know from the Diagram and WoB that a Herald returning to Roshar triggers a Desolation. We don't know where they go in between, how they get there or who is responsible for them being there. We've assumed Odium is responsible for the torture, even though he's not party to the Oathpact, because it makes sense that he would want to force the Heralds back to Roshar and trigger the next Desolation. But maybe it's the Nightwatcher - the Heralds given the boon of immortality and great power in exchange for the curse of torture when they leave Roshar. And maybe the "torture" is all in their heads, occurring in the Cognitive Realm. (Milton's Paradise Lost: "The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.") In short, the Heralds were bound by the Oathpact to leave Roshar, and they didn't control what happened to them in between.
6. And, of course, it's possible this is all wrong, or at least not the "full explanation," and that there's something inherent in the Heralds that causes Desolations if they're on Roshar.

But there is also other evidence supporting the OP's theory. It seems more than coincidence that the Honorblades were taken to the one place on Roshar that receives little Stormlight - Shinovar. I agree with those who think the original Skybreakers became the Stone Shamanate.  By controlling the Honorblades the Skybreakers can limit how much surgebinding goes on.

 

(I also believe the Skybreakers collected many abandoned KR shardblades and sets of shardplate following the Recreance. Someone somewhere observed how relatively few such items have been found on Roshar compared with the many former KR. I think the Skybreakers are also keeping these in Shinovar - why Helaran and Nale's minion in the Lift interlude had such items. But that's not pertinent to this thread.)

[dyring]

Maybe it is this simple.

 

He have seen a correlation:

More new surgebinders = desolation coming.

 

And thus believe it is Because more surgebinders are coming that the desolation is coming. When in truth it seems to be the other way around. New surgebinders are coming because the sprens know that a desolation is coming.

 

Thus, instead of hindering a desolation as Nalan thinks, he is weakening humans for when the desolation comes.

[Seloun]

I'll certainly concede that the Nale may have 'learned' (or was told a clever lie) that Surgebinding brings about the Desolations after the breaking of the Oathpact. However, that was sort of my point - it's difficult to understand the Prelude of TWoK if the theory holds and the Heralds were aware of how things worked before the breaking of the Oathpact. The problem is that there are mutually contradictory pieces of evidence being used to support the argument.

 

If Nale/Heralds learns of it afterwards, then the Heralds leaving the Honorblades isn't really evidence (they would have no reason to think that less Surgebinding = less Desolations, so they obviously would not have used that as the reason to leave their Honorblades) which weakens the original argument pretty significantly.

 

If Nale/Heralds learned of it before, then there has to be an explanation why they left the KR alone (or did not warn them, or whatever) since no matter how inefficient their Surgebinding may have been, surely dozens or hundreds of KR Surgebinding is going to involve a lot more Stormlight usage.

 

I'm inclined to say for now that the person who likely knows best about how the Desolations work is Tanavast. Of course, he has a small problem of being dead. However, we know that his visions appear to say that the KR are necessary to deal with Odium (though it's worth noting that this does not preclude that the KR hasten Desolations; his reasoning might be that it's inevitable Odium gets free whether early or late). He also talks about the Dawnshards, which we know nothing about, which in turn leads me to think there's just not enough information to come to the correct conclusion. That in turn implies to me that theories which don't require a known unknown regarding Odium's binding are likely to be suspect (this is of course meta-reasoning and subject to the usual pitfalls).

 

I'll mention that I believe there's a non-trivial chance that Tanavast's visions are actually suspect (we know that the visions are certainly not a literal depiction of what occurred, since the characters react to Dalinar's actions). The argument from the visions is independent of my initial objection, though.

 

My final point would be that we know (or have good reason to assume) that the return of the Heralds <=> Desolation (i.e. Desolation implies the Heralds are back, and Heralds returning implies a Desolation) based on WoBs. This means it's possible that the causal connection might not be that the KR Surgebinding results in the Desolation, but that KR Surgebinding causes the Heralds to return (maybe it makes their suffering worse). This would still fit with Nale's behavior, but would not suggest that Surgebinding per se directly affected the rate of Desolations (and most relevant to the OP, would not be related the Herald's Surgebinding).

[name_here]

I am quite confident that Nalan has reversed the order of causation here. We have clear statements that the spren are returning because of the impending Desolation, so they cannot be the reason it's coming. Also, if Surgebinding causes the Desolations, there's no good reason for it to happen more than once. Honor could have just made it impossible for humans to surgebind and grabbed the honorblades.

The Diagram says, "the Desolation needs no usher" and we have no reason to doubt that.

[Moogle]

The Diagram says, "the Desolation needs no usher" and we have no reason to doubt that.

 

Except that a Herald, who has intimate knowledge of the Oathpact and the Desolations, seems to think that Surgebinders can bring it, and Mr. T is a man without access to thousands of years of knowledge. Mr. T has done quite a good job, all things considered, but I'd trust Nalan over him in this instance.

 

If Nalan is making a basic error because he's not aware correlation is not causation then it makes for an incredibly poor character overall. He'd just be... stupid. Like, Amaram-level stupid.

[kari-no-sugata]

Except that a Herald, who has intimate knowledge of the Oathpact and the Desolations, seems to think that Surgebinders can bring it, and Mr. T is a man without access to thousands of years of knowledge. Mr. T has done quite a good job, all things considered, but I'd trust Nalan over him in this instance.

I'm not sure how far I'd trust a guy who thinks that a mass murderer (Szeth) is the most awesome person on the planet. Lift doesn't think he's human. There's hints in the books that the Heralds in general aren't exactly sane any more and I'm pretty sure Brandon has said it's a subject he wants to delve into.

 

But even if he's perfectly rational it's also perfectly possible that the interpretation of his words is incorrect.

 

There's also no evidence that Voidbringers can turn up without the Herald(s) returning - they're returning now because Taln is back. Hard to prove something is true if it's never happened.

 

Another problem I have with the theory is that Stormlight gets used anyway - it leaks from the gems whether it's used or not. So why would using it for Surgebinding have some horrible side-effect when using it for lighting doesn't? And why aren't fabrials a problem either? Why is it okay for Szeth to Surgebind?

 

It also feels like a poor storytelling device since if there is some effect it would be really indirect - there's a big gap between the Heralds leaving and the Recreance. Several generations at least. Maybe even 1000 years or so.

 

btw Confused, you say that he "frequently states his concern that surgebinding will bring on a Desolation".  I can only find one reference (at the end of the Lift chapter). I did a quick check of the text and can't find any more. And in that one reference, his usage of it is a little odd - he's referring to it more like a description than an event.

 

[Moogle]

I'm not sure how far I'd trust a guy who thinks that a mass murderer (Szeth) is the most awesome person on the planet. Lift doesn't think he's human. There's hints in the books that the Heralds in general aren't exactly sane any more and I'm pretty sure Brandon has said it's a subject he wants to delve into.

 

Lift doesn't think he's human because he's emotionless. I'm sure Nalan is as human as, er, any immortal human with superpowers can be.

 

In regards to Nalan's feelings on Szeth, I'd argue that just because someone values different things (how well one can keep to their own personal code) does not invalidate basic facts that they know. Nalan is something of a psychopathic killer, but I highly, highly, doubt he's lied anywhere in any of his dialogue. He's very clear on this:

“Others may be detestable, but they do not dabble in arts that could return Desolation to this world.” His words were so cold. “What you are must be stopped.”

 

Nalan thinks Surgebinders could bring a Desolation. There is really no way to misinterpret it. If he's blatantly insane, we have no signs of it. He's acted rationally. He's made and executed plans competently, he just has no trace of sentiment or compassion.

 

As a possible avenue for why Surgebinders could bring Desolation, it's plausible that since spren are copying the Honorblades, each Surgebinder is an "honorary Herald" for purposes of the strictures of the Oathpact, since the Oathpact may have specified the Heralds as "anyone who carries a Blade Invested by Honor" or something.

[Confused]

This is a wonderful conversation. You all raise excellent points. Yes, more information would be very helpful, but if we had perfect information than this Forum wouldn't be much fun. Speculation is what brings us here (or at least me...)

 

So let me step back a little for a BIG PICTURE overview. My starting point for this thread was my post about Odium's Plan. I've been trying to figure out for a while why Odium wants to destroy Roshar. If his goal is to play Highlander ("There can be only one...), and he didn't destroy other planets on which he splintered Shards, why here? That led me to conclude that it must be to free himself from the Roshar system. For the reasons stated in my earlier post, I further concluded that it must be the Surges themselves that hold him here.

 

I intended this thread as a corollary to that conclusion: why do Desolations begin when Heralds return and, more interestingly, why must Heralds leave or they'll start a new Desolation? It seemed to me that, based on the available information, it related to their use of the Surges.

 

Perhaps some of the textual evidence I cited was weak - particularly about the Heralds' abandonment of their Honorblades to permit them to remain on Roshar. Seloun poked a nice hole in that one. But I still think that abandonment had more to do with their remaining on Roshar than merely foreswearing their Oathpact oaths. That would help explain why the Skybreakers (I believe) moved the Honorblades to Shinovar, the place of little Stormlight. Coupled with what is apparently Nale's sole comment about the relationship between surgebinding and Desolations (thank you, Kari), I felt (and feel) that the evidence is sufficient for the theory.

 

Again, whether or not there is textual evidence, the real basis for the theory in this post is the conclusion reached in the earlier post that the Surges imprison Odium. That conclusion predicts this theory: any temporary weakening of the Surges would enable Odium to fight back. Given how little we know this early in the series, to me that's as good a speculation as I can now come up with.

 

Regarding the KR and fabrials using Surges, Moogle had done a better job than I could explaining that one. It may also be that there's something about either the Honorblades or the Heralds themselves that affects the Surges in different ways than the KR's Nahel bond does - different in kind, not just quantity. Nale's comment to Lift may simply be his bent mind thinking the Heralds' and KR's usage is identical in kind.

 

Finally, I want to address one specific point. I am not arguing that the use of Stormlight per se causes this problem. Using Stormlight for lighting and other purposes should have no effect. The problem stems from surgebinding - drawing down on the Surges temporarily until Stormlight can replenish them.

[kari-no-sugata]

Lift doesn't think he's human because he's emotionless. I'm sure Nalan is as human as, er, any immortal human with superpowers can be.

 

And as sane as any human who was broken enough 4500 years ago to abandon a friend/colleague? If this has not been eating away at him I'd be very surprised. For reference, here's a previous discussion on the sanity of the Heralds:

http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/6959-heralds-getting-worse-an-attempt-to-systematize/

 

In regards to Nalan's feelings on Szeth, I'd argue that just because someone values different things (how well one can keep to their own personal code) does not invalidate basic facts that they know. Nalan is something of a psychopathic killer, but I highly, highly, doubt he's lied anywhere in any of his dialogue. He's very clear on this:

“Others may be detestable, but they do not dabble in arts that could return Desolation to this world.” His words were so cold. “What you are must be stopped.”

 

Nalan thinks Surgebinders could bring a Desolation. There is really no way to misinterpret it. If he's blatantly insane, we have no signs of it. He's acted rationally. He's made and executed plans competently, he just has no trace of sentiment or compassion.

 

Here's a quote from the very same chapter (not a co-incidence I suspect) as an example of "Desolation" being used to describe something other than an attack of Voidbringers:

"A Desolation in the form of a single man. Yaezir help the one we choose. It is a death sentence."

 

Note that in your quote, Nalan doesn't say "a Desolation" or "the Desolation" or "Desolations". Unlike Taln:

 

"The time of the Return, the Desolation, is near at hand.

 

Nalan would have seen the events leading up to the Recreance. If Radiants were fighting each other on a large scale that could easily be considered to be as damaging as a real Desolation. This is why Nalan doesn't say "a Desolation" or "the Desolations" in the quote above.

 

Though obviously, this interpretation of mine would be far clearer if he said "desolation" instead of "Desolation", but I think a very simple theory that requires little/no assumptions is a lot better than a big complicated theory that requires lots of assumptions.

 

As a possible avenue for why Surgebinders could bring Desolation, it's plausible that since spren are copying the Honorblades, each Surgebinder is an "honorary Herald" for purposes of the strictures of the Oathpact, since the Oathpact may have specified the Heralds as "anyone who carries a Blade Invested by Honor" or something.

If that was the case then the Voidbringers would return quickly after the "Last Desolation". But they don't.

[Moogle]

Here's a quote from the very same chapter (not a co-incidence I suspect) as an example of "Desolation" being used to describe something other than an attack of Voidbringers:

 

Your quote is from a government official who has no particular knowledge of Desolations. His usage is the common one, ie. a Desolation is an event of great death and destruction. Someone like Nalan would use the word more precisely and appropriately.

 

 

Note that in your quote, Nalan doesn't say "a Desolation" or "the Desolation" or "Desolations". Unlike Taln:

 

Taln is insane and we have plenty of reason to believe that the words he's speaking are false or wrong in some fashion, since he is quite probably not actually Taln. In fact, I'd go so far as to say the fact that he says "the Desolation" as opposed to just "Desolation" like Nalan is evidence he should not be trusted.

 

 

but I think a very simple theory that requires little/no assumptions is a lot better than a big complicated theory that requires lots of assumptions.

 

I agree with the condition that the simpler theory not have strong evidence against it. Nalan being wrong is a huge assertion that remains to be proved. You're basically trying to put forth the theory that a Herald who's lived thousands of years and talked to Honor and actually knows the source of the Desolations is wrong about what causes Desolations. It might be simpler to say that Nalan is wrong and thinks correlation is causation, but that doesn't make it that much more likely to me.

 

 

If that was the case then the Voidbringers would return quickly after the "Last Desolation". But they don't.

 

Why? If Surgebinders count as honorary Heralds, I don't see why this is the case at all. Only one Herald has to return to Damnation to keep the Desolation from returning instantly, and this is what happens. My idea is more that there's something restricting Odium's ability to act, and it was tied to the Oathpact (since it's remarked that "the enemy will not remain bound by this" when the Oathpact is "broken"). If you have "Heralds" running around by the thousands, it's possible that they might be screwing up some little niggling detail of the Oathpact constantly which lets Odium bring a Desolation in when there's enough Surgebinders around.

 

Also as something of a tangent, I'd note that the only supporting fact we have for the idea is that the spren are coming because they sense a Desolation and not that spren coming causes Desolations is because Jasnah off-handedly proposed it as a theory. While I trust in Jasnah, it doesn't strike me as a fact we should take for granted. We have a WoB that a Herald leaving Damnation causes a Desolation to come, but that doesn't mean there aren't other ways it could come about.

[hoser]

Your ...

Also as something of a tangent, I'd note that the only supporting fact we have for the idea is that the spren are coming because they sense a Desolation and not that spren coming causes Desolations is because Jasnah off-handedly proposed it as a theory. While I trust in Jasnah, it doesn't strike me as a fact we should take for granted. We have a WoB that a Herald leaving Damnation causes a Desolation to come, but that doesn't mean there aren't other ways it could come about.

 

The epigraph for Ch 83 also supports the idea that the spren are coming because they sense a desolation. 

The Desolation needs no usher It can and will sit where it wishes and the signs are obvious that the spren anticipate it doing so soon

[kari-no-sugata]

Moogle, I'm not saying Nalan is wrong but that we readers are misinterpreting him (or rather, falling into Brandon's trap). I'll do a summary of how I see things.

This is the summary of my theory on the Recreance: The Radiants were fighting each other (probably reluctantly in most cases) as part of a big war between kingdoms. They were basically weapons of mass destruction and the Recreance was the solution they came up with to stop the terrible destruction they were already causing and to prevent the same thing ever happening again - by murdering their own spren.

 

I've gone into more details in other posts.

 

In Dalinar's Recreance flashback, the Radiants are definitely involved in some big war against an enemy that's deliberately kept vague. It's hard to imagine them fighting non-humans as the Voidbringers were gone and there's no known force could possibly stand up to hundreds (maybe thousands) of Radiants... except other Radiants. If the Radiants had a legitimate enemy it's hard to imagine them abandoning the fight mid-way. I can think of some other possibilities but I like this idea since it's simple and fits well with the general theme of the Stormlight Archive.

 

So when Nalan tells Lift that "Others may be detestable, but they do not dabble in arts that could return Desolation to this world" I think he is specifically referring to the destruction the Radiants were directly causing in the events immediately leading up to the Recreance in my Recreance theory above. Given how Nalan is on following the law / personal code of honour I think it would make plenty of sense that he really hates the Radiants for breaking their Oaths and that he feels justified on preventing another Radiant war.

 

 

Now, on to the reading that somehow Radiants can indirectly cause the return of Voidbringers and a Desolation in the normal sense...

 

If we just consider Nalan's actions, we only ever see him take action against proto-Radiants. If Surgebinding by itself is the problem then this makes Nalan self-contradictory since he should be against Szeth running around Surgebinding with an Honorblade, against fabrials and against Surgebinding animals (I suspect skyeels and chasamfiends are such though we've not seen anyone in-world express such a view yet). Nalan knows about Honorblades and Szeth, he knows about fabrials and he knows about larkin at least. So if Surgebinding by itself is the problem then Nalan is being very erratic in trying to stop it. If Surgebinding humans are the problem somehow (seems to require some convoluted arguments) then why doesn't Nalan ever complain about Szeth? With my theory I think Szeth is given a free pass because Nalan sees him as highly honourable unlike the Radiants of old.

 

If we ignore Nalan's actions then I still see problems: there's a non-trivial gap between the Last Desolation and the Recreance which means that if Surgebinding can somehow cause a "normal" Desolation then it's awfully indirect. Given that a "proper" Desolation never occurred after the last official one, there's no actual proof of a connection. This would make it awfully difficult to prove to the Radiants at the time of the Recreance that they need to take drastic action to stop it - it's the exact same problem Jasnah has in trying to stop the parshmen becoming Voidbringers in advance: the proof needs to be overwhelming. If the Heralds had proof it's hard to imagine how they could find out after the Last Desolation - and if they knew before then they should have done/said something at the time of the Last Desolation.

 

Also, if Nalan has "proof" that Radiants/Surgebinding brings Desolations then why does he add the "could" qualifier in his infamous quote?

[kaellok]

I agree with kari-no-sugata's comments almost entirely (just not about what caused the Recreance  ).  If we take Nin at his word, then we are faced with this:

 

1.  Lift using Regrowth could return Desolation to the world, and she must be killed.

2.  Szeth using INSANE AMOUNTS OF STORMLIGHT TO MURDER PEOPLE ALL AROUND THE WORLD, to the point that it destabilizes multiple nations, is not something that must be stopped.  "I watched you destroy yourself in the name of order, watched you obey your personal code when others would have fled or crumbled.  Szeth-son-Neturo,  iwatched you keep your word with perfection.  This is a thing lost to most people--it is the only genuine beauty in the world."  Nin was not ignorant of Szeth's actions.  He wasn't even ignorant of Szeth's emotional state of being.  This implies that Nin had multiple opportunities, over a period of time, to closely observe Szeth.  If he has more sure knowledge of what causes the Desolations than we do, than nearly anyone in the books do, then surely if usage of Stormlight were responsible he would have killed Szeth.  Without being "corrupted by sentiment," he should have had little difficulty in doing so.

 

The differences between Lift and Szeth is that Lift is a proto-KR, and Szeth is using an Honorblade.  Desolations occurred before KR existed, so if KR can cause Desolation it must be linked to what they do or how they do it.  Szeth using an Honorblade does not threaten to return Desolation to the world, or else presumably Nin would have ended him after he assassinated Gavilar, or perhaps the Highprinces of Jah Keved, or even the king.  This may mean that it is the Nahel bond that accelerates Desolation, but almost certainly not Stormlight or even Surges in general; Szeth is the single greatest user of Stormlight in WoK and much of WoR.  And, most importantly, even if KR can, by nature of the Nahel bond, cause Desolation to occur in the world, knowledge of this had to have come after the Heralds abandoned the Oathpact.  Since this relies mostly on negative evidence (there haven't been any Desolations to test it against that we're aware of, after all), rather than positive, I think we can take it with a grain of salt.

 

tl;dr: Nin's inactions regarding Szeth prove that his actions towards proto-KR are not for the commonly held reasons some people assume (it can't be because of the use of Surges or Stormlight).

Edited May 17, 2014 by kaellok

[Aleksiel]

Lift wan't using Regrowth before her Interlude and Nale has been after her long before that, he said it himself he wasn't sure which order she'd be. Not that this disproves you, but I wanted to clarify.

[kaellok]

Ah, good point on that, Aleksiel.  I think that is only a stronger argument that it's not use of Surges, Surgebinding, or Stormlight that he's trying to stop, tho.

[kari-no-sugata]

This is a wonderful conversation. You all raise excellent points. Yes, more information would be very helpful, but if we had perfect information than this Forum wouldn't be much fun. Speculation is what brings us here (or at least me...)

 

So let me step back a little for a BIG PICTURE overview. My starting point for this thread was my post about Odium's Plan. I've been trying to figure out for a while why Odium wants to destroy Roshar. If his goal is to play Highlander ("There can be only one...), and he didn't destroy other planets on which he splintered Shards, why here? That led me to conclude that it must be to free himself from the Roshar system. For the reasons stated in my earlier post, I further concluded that it must be the Surges themselves that hold him here.

 

I don't know how long you spent writing that post in the link but if you have as much trouble writing quickly as I do it would likely be a day or two

To respond to this as briefly as I can: I don't see Surges as being "power" themselves but expressions of power (Stormlight specifically), like how the force of gravity isn't weakened by it acting on something. From a story/plot point of view I also don't like the idea that the only power the protagonists have to fight back with dooms them in the long run - it also makes Honor's recommendation to reform the Radiants seem odd to say the least. You could argue that maybe Odium has twisted Honor's "recording" (like Ruin in Mistborn) but I really doubt Brandon would want to repeat himself that way (between series he seems to prefer doing the opposite of what he's done before or something completely new, from what he's said/written on the subject).

We don't really know what's going on in the background but we do know this:

http://www.theoryland.com/intvmain.php?i=836

"What I probably should've said to be more precise is that Honor and Cultivation were there long before Odium showed up."

http://www.theoryland.com/intvmain.php?i=1041

"Odium's presence is felt on Roshar, but he is on Braize, the 3rd planet in the system."

In the letters from/to Hoid in tWoK/WoR I don't know how literally we should take them but I don't see how Odium can be imprisoned in the normal sense if he's actually on Braize. It's even harder to imagine how something specific to Roshar (eg Stormlight, Surges etc) could hold Odium captive on Braize.

 

It may be that a part of Odium's power is stuck on Roshar and that has weakened him enough that he doesn't want to risk leaving Braize again to attack other Shards (including Cultivation) but I don't have any particular evidence for that. From what Honor tells Dalinar it sounds like Odium has something to lose - maybe Odium is at risk of permanently losing the part of his power on Roshar rather than temporarily losing it which is why Odium is being patient and careful (it seems).

If the Surges themselves could somehow trap this part of Odium then my suggestion above could work with yours but I just fundamentally don't see the Surges working like that in the first place.

 

 

Finally, I want to address one specific point. I am not arguing that the use of Stormlight per se causes this problem. Using Stormlight for lighting and other purposes should have no effect. The problem stems from surgebinding - drawing down on the Surges temporarily until Stormlight can replenish them.

If Surgebinding is the fundamental problem then whatever is causing the Surgebinding should not matter - a Radiant "drawing down the Surge" should be no different from a Herald or fabrial doing the same. I don't think it's possible to draw down a Surge of course but even if I'm wrong I don't see how Nalan's words can be evidence for your theory unless you also accept he's being incredibly unfair/inconsistent.

 

 

PS Note to all I've been arguing with here: I can sometimes be quite direct and blunt. If so, please don't let this put you off. In general, I'm totally fine if any of my predictions are wrong because it's generally much more interesting than being right

 

What I mainly hope to get out of these discussions is ideas I wouldn't have thought of otherwise - I've had a few just writing this post.

[kaellok]

*ahem* I also tend to be rather direct or blunt or shout-y in efforts to get my point across, but that should be taken as an abundance of exuberance and not anything negative.  I think that this has been a great conversation, and the idea Confused brought up is a really neat one that is more than worthy of exploring.  The fact that I disagree with it is irrelevant; I love seeing debates and discussions like this one, because it's always really neat to see what and how other people saw in the books that I missed or interpreted differently.

[Seloun]

One crazy idea that did occur to me during the course of this thread (and the other referenced thread) was to take the concept of Surges trapping Odium in a literal sense. What if...Odium is one of the moons (the 'that's no moon' theory)?

 

Maybe gravitation is literally what's holding Odium in the system. Eliminating the majority of the mass of Roshar would 'free' him from its bindings.

 

Also, some thoughts about the Desolations. Based on the events of WoR, we can probably conclude the main, defining difference between Desolations and not-Desolations is the presence of Voidbringers, which appear to be effectively Odiumspren-bonded Parshendi.

 

The interesting this is that the process of generating Voidbringers appears to simply be the presence of Odiumspren near Parshendi when a highstorm comes. This begs the question why then we never see Voidbringers outside of the Desolations. One possibility is that somehow all the Odiumspren have to be eliminated for the Desolation to be over; this seems like an overly strict requirement, since it seems possible to 'bottle' Odiumspren to be used later (though this is suggested to be a relatively new development). Instead, it seems more likely that the Stormfather may have the ability to 'deny' bonds to Parshendi, but are under some restrictions as part of the Oathpact in letting the bonds form as long as the Heralds are on Roshar. So when the Heralds return, the Stormfather has to allow Odiumspren to bond Parshendi, thus beginning a Desolation; once majority of the Voidbringers are eliminated, the Heralds leave and the Stormfather can stop the generation of new Voidbringers.

 

This would explain why the Everstorm is so inevitably deadly, and why this is the 'final' Desolation: the Stormfather and his highstorm are no longer required for the generation of Voidbringers (since the Everstorm can empower the change as well). So regardless of whether or not the Heralds leave Roshar, Voidbringers will keep being generated, and the 'Desolation' will never end (at least until someone hits the exhaust port on the Odiumoon and depowers the Everstorm...).

[kari-no-sugata]

*ahem* I also tend to be rather direct or blunt or shout-y in efforts to get my point across, but that should be taken as an abundance of exuberance and not anything negative.  I think that this has been a great conversation, and the idea Confused brought up is a really neat one that is more than worthy of exploring.  The fact that I disagree with it is irrelevant; I love seeing debates and discussions like this one, because it's always really neat to see what and how other people saw in the books that I missed or interpreted differently.

 

Here's some things I've thought of before but not yet written up:

We know that the Stormlight Archive is split into two 5 book parts with a time gap between them (10 years or something). I suspect that the remaining 3 books for the first half will deal with defeating with the storm that the Parshendi created and the spren willing to trust humans enough again to bond them in significant numbers. The Parshendi storm might not be the true Everstorm but a warm-up. In the second half we'll see a "proper" Desolation, large numbers of Radiants, massive progress in fabrials and maybe the Heralds coming out into the open again.

 

While working on my posts, I was looking through some older interviews with Brandon last night, from before tWoK came out. It's quite interesting looking back at them now:

 

http://www.theoryland.com/intvsresults.php?kwt=stormlight%20archive'

I've wanted to do a series, then, where the magic isn't going away—it's coming back. Where the world is becoming a more wondrous place. Where new races aren't vanishing, they're being discovered.

 

I haven't, but I can tell you about it. I'm pretty open on these things. One of the ideas that made me want to write this book—a series; I'm calling it Stormlight Archive. I'm not sure if that will be the final series title. I don't know. These things always change. But I love that feel. Anyway, it's got a good feel to it. The Way of Kings...When I was growing up reading fantasy, and even still when I read fantasy, one thing kind of makes me sorrowful about the fantasy genre. Not that I dislike it, but it wakens sorrow in me, and that is, there tends to be a theme in fantasy that the magic is going away. Whether it's you read Tolkien, the elves are leaving. The world is becoming more like our world. This happens in Terry Brooks; this happens in David Eddings. This happens in a lot of these great fantasy series I grew up reading, and it still happens. The fantasy is this thing that's growing more rare. You know, it's the Last Wizard, the Last Unicorn, the last...These sorts of things. And there's a little bit of a sense of loss in me for that. And I really wanted to do a story which is about magic coming back. An epic fantasy about the return of magic to the world after a long period of it being gone. Which is kind of the opposite. There are no mentors around who are great, powerful magicians that can teach you how to use it, because nobody—nobody knows. It's been thousands of years. So I want to tell the story about the return of magic to the world, right about the time that it's time it's needed because of various things that are showing up. So, that's going to be one of the themes of this book; it's the return of magic.

 

I don't know that this is new information, but the story of the Stormlight Archive revolves around ten orders of knights, each of whom had their own magics and abilities, who fell thousands of years ago for reasons no one understands. Some say they betrayed mankind, others say they were destroyed, others say they were charlatans all along.

 

The Stormlight Archive deals with the history of these knights, discovering what happened to them. It also deals, perhaps, with their redemption. Another big theme has to do with the onset of a magical industrial revolution, so to speak. Think of this as Renaissance-era technology where people are discovering how to harness magic and use it in practical ways. I've always wanted to do a story about the dawning of something like the Age of Legends in the Wheel of Time books.

Sounds to me like the Radiants are supposed to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem, even if they did screw up badly once. We'll have to see...

 

But personally, why do I include the races that I include? I'm just looking for interesting things that complement the story that I'm telling. The races in The Way of Kings come directly into the story and the mystery of what's happened before. If you pay close attention to what the races are, it tells you something about what's going to happen in the future and what's happened in the past. It's very conscious.

The quote above is quite interesting. I suspect there's lots more to come about the Horneaters. Rock says they were feared in the past. I have wondered if maybe, just maybe, that in Dalinar's Recreance vision that the Radiants could have been fighting Horneaters but that would require the Horneaters to be far far more dangerous than we had thought previously. I also get the feeling that there's just a bit too many references to Shallan's red hair likely pointing to Horneater blood in her ancestry - that it's foreshadowing... something.