[theory] a subversion of expetations with regards to the 5th oath of the Windrunners

[SpinningSky he/him]

Hello,

This idea started as a silly almost "fanfiction" over on Reddit (some of this is verbatum from there), but truth is the more I think about, the more I like how it closes Kal's arc, I think it's pretty cool and something Brandon might pull.
I decided to hop over here hoping to see how this could canonically work with you, fine scholars of the shard!
I am quite happy with some of the ideas I have, it's possible but wouldn't go as far as to say it's likely, I'll appreciate any feedback to either deny or confirm it.
 

the premise
the only 5th ideal we know is that of the Skybreakers. According to it, the radiant becomes the law, this of course requires almost a sacrifice of one's humanity to become a pure embodiment of the ideal (which is no problem for a mad Herald of course).
If we assume this to be the case for Windrunners as well, I think it would be a very bad ending to Kal's arc to have him give his humanity away to an extent, I think it would be horrible to end Kal's story with any act of self-sacrifice really.

my outline
During the book (WaT), there starts to be a general understanding of the sacrifice any 5th ideal would require.
Kal feels he is ready to speak it, buy Syl kind of avoids the topic, she's even more defensive than usual about ideals.

In the meanwhile in Urithiru, Dabbid is starting to come out of his shell and gets some help at Kal's psych ward.
He also gets a new friend: Notum the Honorspren.
While he's not willing to bond a radiant, Notum decided, to try and come to the phisical realm in his congitive form (yes, it's a big leap) , he and Dabbid get paired up because the spren needs his help with some physical things, the two "bond" in a friendly way, Notum appreciates the "straightforwardness" of Dabbid, they make a funny pairing.

[Skip to the book final climax]

They are all together, and to beat whatever they're facing, they need Kal to speak the 5th ideal, but we see Syl is still conflicted, she knows he's ready, but she also understands that if he does speak it, he'll never get a chance to live a normal life.

In the middle of this crisis, Notum finally has a change of heart and opens himself up to bonding Dabbid.
Dabbid knows the oaths, no one like him has spent time listening to the radiants, and while he never spoke them, in his simple way he truly, profoundly believes them.

He stands up, and speaks the 1st oath. Looks at his friends, and speaks the 2nd. He starts walking towards their enemies, as he speaks the 3rd and Notum appears as a spear in hand. He starts running\flying towards the enemies, windspren follow him, he speaks the 4th and his plate forms.
Dabbid looks back at Kal, smiles and mouths "Bridge Four".
He speaks the 5th, and saves the day in glorious radiance.
Dabbid gives Kal the greatest gift he could, the chance to live a normal life, returning the favor of saving him many years back.
"Kal had finally saved someone, and that someone had in turn, saved him"

Why I like this so much arc wise
I think we have two major arcs to close with Kal:
-we need to get Kal to feel like he finally saved someone 
-we need Kal to accept others can sacrifice themselves for him, and be content with where he is without striving for more
btw I'm not impling his depression gets "solved", I mean this as "learning to live with it"

I think this idea closes both arcs in a pretty little knot, having the first person he saved "sacrifice" himself for him, though this "sacrifice", for Dabbid, is actually an act of self-healing, so in the same scene not only someone saves Kal, but Kal sees how, over the course of 5 books, he saved someone else, giving worth to all of his struggles, as he enabled Dabbid to become the strongest radiant on Roshar.

so, canon, few things that come to mind

Dabbid: I think this works in terms of Dabbid, matter of fact if you believe this theory, it really feels like he was written with this in mind all along. We have no doubt he believes and knows the oaths, but there's a good reason he hasn't been speaking them

Fifth ideal: I don't think I have a strong argument in favor of my premise, given the 4th ideal was about accepting limitations, it would be a bit weird for the very last one to go in the opposite direction. For the skybreakers it's always about giving yourself up to "something" so it's more linear.

Notum (or some honorspren): we have no real reason to believe there's a way for a honorspren to befriend a radiant while knowingly avoiding a bond, but for the ideals speedrun there has to be an established strong relationship between radiant and spren I feel, so I came up with whatever might make it work, but again there's no reason to believe it to be likely.

 

 

So what do you think?

cheers

[JustQuestin2004 he/him]

I think that a Consecutive Oath Swearing all the way from First to Fifth would be awesome, even more so if it's Dabbid who was MVP in ROW. I do doubt that it'll be Notum though.

Preview Chapter Spoiler

Spoiler

Notum implied that he'll be working on building up the Honorspren Navy and take the fight to the Voidbringers within Shadesmar, which I think is just as awesome.

But Kaladin deciding to just stay at the Fourth and not feeling the need to swear the Fifth, giving himself the option to potentially retire and live a normal life sounds like a fitting end to Kaladin's journey. Though I have a feeling he won't be retiring right away if that does happen.

[+JesterLavorre she/they]

I love the idea of consecutive oath swearing. It sounds so epic, if it happens it would definitely be in book five or ten at the end of an arc.

Everything else I also like, though how likely it is I don’t know. I do think it would be cool to see the subversion of Kaladin not swearing the fifth ideal, and if that happened I think we would need to still se someone swear the fifth Windrunner ideal or it would be a letdown. This definite feels like if Brandon wanted to go the route of Kal not swearing the fifth this book it would be a way to make it an exciting twist instead of a disappointing one.