Thoughts about Honor's death

[Kranse]

Honor's death has been a great unanswered question since TWoK, but after RoW, I think we can make some educated guesses about what happened. The biggest clue comes from Rayse's negotiations with Dalinar, where he reveals that breaking his agreement with Dalinar would leave him fatally exposed. This could all be exposition, revealing to us readers some fundamental rules about the nature of shards. Maybe a bit of misdirection too; just as we start hypothesizing about how Odium could be defeated through a broken oath, he gets stabbed in the face. But it seems like bad storytelling to show us a Chekhov's gun that can kill a shard and never pull the trigger. Unless, of course, the gun has already been fired. And it seems poetic for the god of oaths to be undone by a broken promise. 

Theory: Honor was able to be killed because he broke an agreement/oath

The obvious follow-up questions are "what is the agreement?" and "who did he make it with?" One possible answer is that he made some kind of deal with Odium. This seems plausible - Odium is bound to Roshar by something Honor did, and I don't think he could have done so unconditionally without Odium's compliance. But if Odium agreed to be bound under some conditions, and Honor violated those conditions, it feels like Odium would have been able to free himself rather than simply kill Honor's vessel. Additionally, I don't think Tanavast would be dumb enough to make an agreement with Rayse and then violate it in such a way as to put himself at Rayse's mercy. And if that did happen, there's no way Rayse would take partial credit; he would not exclaim "We killed you!" as he did in Oathbringer.

Instead, I think Honor broke an agreement he made with the Singers and/or the Fused. Once that happened, Tanavast exposed himself to the Fused, and Odium somehow empowered them to deal the killing blow. This would mean that the Fused named Rine, who also says "We killed [Honor]," was not speaking metaphorically or in a vague collective sense, but literally.

I have some evidence to support this theory, and piece together approximately what promise was broken. The first has to do with Windrunners and Honorspren - it does not seem like a coincidence that the Windrunner oaths are all about protection. "The choice of Honor is life" and all that. From the Eila Steele, we know that after humanity destroyed Ashyn, Tanavast commanded the Singers to accept the human refugees. The steele suggests that the Singers did so out of pity and compassion, but it seems obvious that many would have objections. I think the leaders among the Singers (who would eventually become the Fused), demanded that Honor make an oath along the lines of "I will protect you from them" or more specifically "I will not allow the humans to destroy you with surgebinding" before they agreed.

Consider how the timing lines up. Prior to his death, Honor apparently was going insane and no longer considering the meaning behind oaths, just the oaths themselves. In this state of mind, he might not consider the capturing of BAM and subsequent lobotomizing of the Singer race as "destroying" them. But it's obvious to the rest of us that such an atrocity is equivalent to genocide. When the Fused learned what happened, they would seek vengeance against the shard that allowed it to happen.

Also, this theory helps explain another question I've had: Humanity "won" every desolation, but apparently never tried to exterminate the Singers after the Heralds sealed away the Fused and Regals. Genocide is bad, but towards the end the desolations occurred so frequently that people were living through several of them over the span of their lives. Surely there would have been powerful factions willing to do whatever was necessary to end the desolations once and for all. Unless, of course, Honor himself forbade it.

 

TLDR: I think Honor promised to protect the Singers, and the Fused perceived the imprisoning of BAM as a violation of that promise, allowing them to kill him

[+mdross81]

Cool theory @Kranse.  I’ve also thought for a while now that Tanavast likely broke an agreement and thereby put himself at risk. My own theory had been that he and Rayse had agreed to a proxy war between humans and singers and that Tanavast directly intervened in some way that violated the terms. But I like yours better.

Your theory has an interesting take on the line about Honor being more obsessed with oaths themselves instead of the meanings behind the oaths. I had always figured that this meant he was overly strict in his view of complying with oaths. But you’re totally right that it could instead mean he was actually being lax and viewing oaths as fulfilled, rather than broken, through technicalities about the wording.

[mathiau]

If Honour had broken broken an oath his death would have been nearly instantaneous, not over the course of centuries.

[+mdross81]

1 hour ago, mathiau said:

If Honour had broken broken an oath his death would have been nearly instantaneous, not over the course of centuries.

I don’t follow. The OP never suggested that Honor’s death took place over centuries. Are you saying that you think it did? At any rate, if the broken oath was allowing the imprisonment of BAM and the resulting harm to the singers, as the OP suggested, that would fit with Honor “dying” right around that time. By that I mean the killing blow would have been struck around that time, although as we’ve learned, Shard death is an extended process.

Of course, now that I think about it more, there is a problem with @Kranse’s theory. As far as we know, there were not any Fused around on Roshar to have struck at Honor around the time of BAM’s imprisonment. They were all still stuck on Braize because Taln was still holding.

 

[Kranse]

I don't know if physical distance would matter for something like this, I imagine Odium and Honor being locked in conflict in the spiritual realm (like what we see in Mistborn). But when Honor betrays the Fused, Odium is able to use them as a weapon against him, sort of like a shardblade that can be summoned to the spiritual realm.

It would also explain why Odium switched sides and created the fused in the first place. Once Honor made a promise to them, Odium wanted to keep them around until they could be weaponized. 

[+mdross81]

1 minute ago, Kranse said:

I don't know if physical distance would matter for something like this, I imagine Odium and Honor being locked in conflict in the spiritual realm (like what we see in Mistborn). But when Honor betrays the Fused, Odium is able to use them as a weapon against him, sort of like a shardblade that can be summoned to the spiritual realm.

Fair enough. I guess it would make sense for a strike taking advantage of a hole in the soul from a broken oath to happen in the spiritual realm. And the Fused get involved through spiritual mumbo jumbo. Could work.

[Frustration]

1 hour ago, mdross81 said:

I don’t follow. The OP never suggested that Honor’s death took place over centuries. Are you saying that you think it did? At any rate, if the broken oath was allowing the imprisonment of BAM and the resulting harm to the singers, as the OP suggested, that would fit with Honor “dying” right around that time. By that I mean the killing blow would have been struck around that time, although as we’ve learned, Shard death is an extended process.

Honor had been dying for long before the recreance.

[+mdross81]

5 hours ago, Frustration said:

Honor had been dying for long before the recreance.

Is there a quote or WoB on this?

[Frustration]

2 hours ago, mdross81 said:

Is there a quote or WoB on this?

Several, though the books are not on me, Stormfather mentioned several times in OB that Honor began acting irrational, and for an entire generation of Radiants was unable to help them deal with the truth about human immigration, one of the gems talk about Honor changing, The Sibling withdrawing before the recreance, etc.

[mathiau]

9 hours ago, mdross81 said:

I don’t follow. The OP never suggested that Honor’s death took place over centuries.

I don't see when I suggested OP had suggested Honour's death was a long thing.

Quote

Are you saying that you think it did?

 I'm saying Brandon said it did

Quote

Questioner

Dalinar's visions are the memories of Honor, correct?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. Yes, they are things specifically created by Honor...

Questioner

Does that mean that the Recreance happened before Honor's death... since Dalinar sees it?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. But Honor's death, like Preservation's death, is a protracted event.

Oathbringer release party (Nov. 13, 2017)

[+mdross81]

47 minutes ago, Frustration said:

Several, though the books are not on me, Stormfather mentioned several times in OB that Honor began acting irrational, and for an entire generation of Radiants was unable to help them deal with the truth about human immigration, one of the gems talk about Honor changing, The Sibling withdrawing before the recreance, etc.

Ok. I had taken those lines as evidence that Honor was going mad, but not necessarily that he was in the process of dying. I have thought that the madness could have been self-inflicted. That Honor had either done something inconsistent with his Shard’s intent or sacrificed to seal Odium away.

36 minutes ago, mathiau said:

I'm saying Brandon said it did

Ok. I see what you mean. I think I was thrown by you saying “over centuries” because that seemed more specific than the WoB saying it was “protracted.” I’ll grant that the WoB suggests that Honor may have begun the process of dying before the Recreance.

Edit: I found a couple of quotes talking about how Honor was dying at the time of the Recreance.

RoW 66:

Quote

“How did you know about this ability?” Dalinar said, eyes still closed.

I heard it described before I fully lived. Melishi saw these lines.

“The last Bondsmith,” Dalinar said. “Before the Recreance.”

The same. Honor was dying, possibly mad.

And OB 113:

Quote

My memory of all this is … strange. First, I was not fully awake; I was but the spren of a storm. Then I was like a child. Changed and shaped during the frantic last days of a dying god.

Later in 113:

Quote

But in the days leading to the Recreance, Honor was dying. When that generation of knights learned the truth, Honor did not support them.

But I don’t know that any of these suggest that he had been dying for a long time before the Recreance. Certainly not centuries if he started  dying some time between the previous generation and the generation of KR around at the time of the Recreance.

Edited June 15, 2021 by mdross81

[Frustration]

1 hour ago, mdross81 said:

Ok. I had taken those lines as evidence that Honor was going mad, but not necessarily that he was in the process of dying. I have thought that the madness could have been self-inflicted. That Honor had either done something inconsistent with his Shard’s intent or sacrificed to seal Odium away.

Ok. I see what you mean. I think I was thrown by you saying “over centuries” because that seemed more specific than the WoB saying it was “protracted.” I’ll grant that the WoB suggests that Honor may have begun the process of dying before the Recreance.

Edit: I found a couple of quotes talking about how Honor was dying at the time of the Recreance.

RoW 66:

And OB 113:

Later in 113:

But I don’t know that any of these suggest that he had been dying for a long time before the Recreance. Certainly not centuries if he started  dying some time between the previous generation and the generation of KR around at the time of the Recreance.

Like the WoB @mathiau posted said, it was a protracted even like Preservation's

and we know from SH and WoB that that had taken thousands of years.

Edited June 15, 2021 by Frustration

[Kranse]

I don't think my theory is inconsistent with a protracted death. Clearly Odium had been striking at Honor for a long time leading up to this point, damaging his sanity and hurting him in ways that we can't fully comprehend. I think that if Honor were in his right mind, he never would have allowed Melishi to imprison BAM. This sequence of events was simply the deathblow, like the moment when an elk falters and the wolves are able to strike at the jugular.

Edited June 15, 2021 by Kranse

[+mdross81]

3 hours ago, Frustration said:

Like the WoB @mathiau posted said, it was a protracted even like Preservation's

and we know from SH and WoB that that had taken thousands of years.

Maybe you’re right. I was just thinking it  was possible that the start of the dying process happened closer in time to the Recreance; not necessarily long before.

[Serack]

@mathiau, @mdross81, I thought we had already documented all the relevant quotes on this subject in this topic that you both participated in:

 

Edit:  I liked it so much, I link it as a reference in the collection of references linked in my sig.  

Edited June 16, 2021 by Serack

[MGershone]

On 6/15/2021 at 9:04 AM, mdross81 said:

But in the days leading to the Recreance, Honor was dying. When that generation of knights learned the truth, Honor did not support them.

 

On 6/14/2021 at 3:04 PM, Kranse said:

I think Honor broke an agreement he made with the Singers and/or the Fused.

 

TLDR: I think Honor promised to protect the Singers, and the Fused perceived the imprisoning of BAM as a violation of that promise, allowing them to kill him

 

Is it possible that the broken oath isn't a sudden thing? What if the oath was some sort of complex deal or treaty? Honor begins to "break" it, little by little, and that causes him to begin unraveling. Eventually, the Recreance - the proverbial straw on the camel's back - pushes him over the edge and he is weakened enough to be killed. This is similar to what happened with Preservation, whose efforts to preserve Scadrial drove him insane and eventually killed him.

[Binder]

12 hours ago, MGershone said:

 

Is it possible that the broken oath isn't a sudden thing? What if the oath was some sort of complex deal or treaty? Honor begins to "break" it, little by little, and that causes him to begin unraveling. Eventually, the Recreance - the proverbial straw on the camel's back - pushes him over the edge and he is weakened enough to be killed. This is similar to what happened with Preservation, whose efforts to preserve Scadrial drove him insane and eventually killed him.

The theory is interesting but I have a hard time agreeing with this; Honor was the god of oaths, and as such it seems both logical (Storywise) for him to die of this, yet illogical because of the Stormfathers insistence that he loved Humans, and that Honor died for them. I suppose it would be plausible for Honor to have sidestepped an oath, but I doubt he would break it outright. More to the point, even Raboniel (I could be wrong here) doesn’t know how Honor died. If it had been something done by the Singers, Raboniel, as one of the nine (formerly) would have known about it. I could be wrong so feel free to help me out here

[+mdross81]

2 hours ago, Binder said:

More to the point, even Raboniel (I could be wrong here) doesn’t know how Honor died. If it had been something done by the Singers, Raboniel, as one of the nine (formerly) would have known about it.

I also thought this seemed odd if, in fact, the Fused helped kill Odium.

But if you look at the context of what Raboniel is saying there it seems like it’s possible she means that they don’t know the mechanism used to actually kill him. In other words she might know how Honor ended up in a position where he was vulnerable but just doesn’t fully understand how he was then Splintered. 

[Binder]

1 hour ago, mdross81 said:

I also thought this seemed odd if, in fact, the Fused helped kill Odium.

But if you look at the context of what Raboniel is saying there it seems like it’s possible she means that they don’t know the mechanism used to actually kill him. In other words she might know how Honor ended up in a position where he was vulnerable but just doesn’t fully understand how he was then Splintered. 

This might be slightly besides the point but I have been wondering about something. If Cultivation has truly turned sides and is now on Odium’s side, doesn’t this expose the Stormfather? Odium wanted to kill him but couldn’t as fear of Cultivation’s retaliation. If she truly has switched then Stormfather is truly in trouble. (Slightly off topic haha)

[+mdross81]

3 hours ago, Binder said:

If Cultivation has truly turned sides and is now on Odium’s side, doesn’t this expose the Stormfather? Odium wanted to kill him but couldn’t as fear of Cultivation’s retaliation. If she truly has switched then Stormfather is truly in trouble. (Slightly off topic haha)

This might be more of a concern if the SF was talking about possibly being splintered by Odium back when Honor was splintered. But I think when the SF says that he could have been splintered but wasn’t, he’s referring to the time in OB when he was holding Odium back so that Dalinar could talk to Venli in a vision. The SF says this in response to Dalinar asking if he’s ok after the end of that vision when he heard the SF crying and whimpering that Odium was too strong:

Quote

He wiped his face with the towel and reached out to the Stormfather. “Feeling any better?”

I do not feel like men. I do not sicken like men. I am. The Stormfather rumbled. I could have been destroyed, though. Splintered into a thousand pieces. I live only because the enemy fears exposing himself to a strike from Cultivation.

That reads like a present tense fear to me. So as late as Oathbringer the SF still believes that Odium fears an attack from Cultivation. And I don’t think anything has happened since then that would have caused Cultivation to turn.

[+mdross81]

3 hours ago, Binder said:

If Cultivation has truly turned sides and is now on Odium’s side, doesn’t this expose the Stormfather? Odium wanted to kill him but couldn’t as fear of Cultivation’s retaliation. If she truly has switched then Stormfather is truly in trouble. (Slightly off topic haha)

This might be more of a concern if the SF was talking about possibly being splintered by Odium back when Honor was splintered. But I think when the SF says that he could have been splintered but wasn’t, he’s referring to the time in OB when he was holding Odium back so that Dalinar could talk to Venli in a vision. The SF says this in response to Dalinar asking if he’s ok after the end of that vision when he heard the SF crying and whimpering that Odium was too strong:

Quote

He wiped his face with the towel and reached out to the Stormfather. “Feeling any better?”

I do not feel like men. I do not sicken like men. I am. The Stormfather rumbled. I could have been destroyed, though. Splintered into a thousand pieces. I live only because the enemy fears exposing himself to a strike from Cultivation.

That reads like a present tense fear to me. So as late as Oathbringer the SF still believes that Odium fears an attack from Cultivation. And I don’t think anything has happened since then that would have caused Cultivation to turn.

[Waffles]

I think Honor promised Cultivation to never harm/restrict the spren and the broken oaths by radiants had been harming him for ages but the imprisonment of Ba Ado Mishram and the resulting purge of radiants finally destroyed Honor in a wave of sprenocide and broken promises. Odium's corruption of spren was a deliberate attempt to corner Honor into harming them

In order to shatter odium though, odium's vessel has to be forced to do things out of anti-hate. Rayse couldnt be shattered because was incapable of the opposite of hate. Therefore cultivation realized she had to slay Rayse.

The oath broken by odium was probably that he cannot kill the heralds, but since he killed Jezrien he was at Cultivation's mercy the entire time as she positioned Taravangian to be the new vessel. Taravangian cares only about the survival of Roshar and would be willing to sacrifice himself and anyone else to save Roshar thus providing a protection to Roshar beyond measure though the shard itself will eventually threaten the entire planet.

Edited June 17, 2021 by Waffles
Rearranged.

[MGershone]

16 hours ago, Binder said:

The theory is interesting but I have a hard time agreeing with this; Honor was the god of oaths, and as such it seems both logical (Storywise) for him to die of this, yet illogical because of the Stormfathers insistence that he loved Humans, and that Honor died for them. I suppose it would be plausible for Honor to have sidestepped an oath, but I doubt he would break it outright. More to the point, even Raboniel (I could be wrong here) doesn’t know how Honor died. If it had been something done by the Singers, Raboniel, as one of the nine (formerly) would have known about it. I could be wrong so feel free to help me out here

I see what you're saying, and in a way, it's my point. Honor's whole problem was that he had a desire to sav and protect the humans, but had made deals that prevented him from that. So he started to try and get around those oaths, which created problems. The same way Kal had problems in WoR because he wanted to do the "right thing" - kill Elhokar - but not break his Windrunner oaths.

[TheCruelSadist]

I like the theory that Honor swore to protect the Singers, and 'began to die' when the Singers felt Tanavast wasn't keeping his promise. 

Or, mirroring Kaladin's story, maybe Honor made promises to both groups and found he couldn't keep them (remember, the dude's foresight isn't that great).  He protected 'Elhokar,' but had to break an oath to 'Moash,' and in doing so, damaged himself.  Actually, as I type this, I realize the power likely would have prevented him from making a choice, because he CAN'T break an oath.  So where Kal could say "I made a mistake, I need to break this oath," and essentially fix his Spiritual problems, Honor couldn't, and it began to wear away at him.

[apepi]

I think when the humans came along, Honor chose to help them while they were allied with him. It caused him problems helping them then the humans came and hurt the singers and it caused him to break an oath. 

 

It could also relate to the deal that is keeping Odium trapped on Roshar.