Theory on Binding of Odium

[CtrlAltDepressed]

This thread got me thinking about this:

 

I have a theory to propose. Those of you who are good with timelines and such, please shoot as many holes in this as possible. 

 

We know that Ishar went to Honor to create the Oathpact. We know that Ishar held a dawnshard and destroyed Ashyn. We also know that Honor bound Odium to Roshar. We also know that these are tangentially related:

Spoiler

Eric

For the second letter, Rayse is captured and cannot leave the system he inhabits, Roshar. Is the fact that Odium can't leave Roshar a direct result of the Oathpact, or something else?

Brandon Sanderson

Not a direct result of the Oathpact, but the Oathpact was part of it.

 

My theory is how they all connect. 

 

In my head it goes like this:

-Ishar has a Dawnshard on Ashyn and destroys the planet with it because of Odiums influence

-Ishar uses the Dawnshard and his surgebinding to migrate humans to Roshar. 

-Odium begins causing trouble on Roshar

-Ishar goes to Honor for help

-Ishar offers the Dawnshard he holds in exchange for the Oathpact / Honorblades

-Honor uses this Dawnshard to chain Odium to the Rosharan system 

-This all works especially well when going off the theory linked about that the dawnshard he held is 'Bind' or 'Connect' or something similar

 

This could also explain how Honor was killed. Source:

Spoiler

R'Shara

Did Honor and Cultivation binding Odium to the Roshar system directly cause the death stroke to Honor?

Brandon Sanderson

*sighs indecisively for a good ten seconds* RAFO. It's fiddly.

By forcing Odium to remain on Roshar, Honor was breaking the oath he made to the other shards to not settle. Yes, that oath was not official or whatever, but Honor is the shard of Oaths. In addition, he was forcing Odium to break his side of that agreement. I could totally see this being enough to kill Honor. 

 

 

Thoughts? Problems? Additions?

Edited October 24, 2024 by CtrlAltDepressed

[listerfeend]

This all seems logical to me, the only thing I can take issue with is that I don't know that we know that Ishar was a Dawnshard. Also, I don't think bringing a Dawnshard into the Binding of Odium to the Roshar System is entirely necessary. We have another instance of one shard binding another on Scadrial, and, frankly, Leras exhibited much of the same issues in his last years of life as Tanavast has been depicted as having here. He was losing his mind, dying slowly, and making plans for the future to help continue to contain and/or defeat the problematic Shard. 

Both of these are fairly minor quibbles, however. We don't know that Ishar wasn't a Dawnshard, so that lies totally within the realm of possibility for me, as we do know that a Dawnshard was involved in the destruction of Ashyn, and a Bondsmith was involved in the Wordlhop from Ashyn to Roshar. Very well could be Ishar for the former, and seems silly to suggest it WASN'T Ishar for the latter. 

As for Honor's seeming mirror of Leras' final days, all we really have is fragments of snippets that tell us that he was "raving" at the end about ancient weapons, dawnshards, and Surgebinding destroying Roshar. He may well have used a Dawnshard to contain Odium, though I still leave open the possibility that he had no need of such a thing to accomplish the goal of restricting Odium to the system. I do suspect that, if a Dawnshard were to have been involved in that binding, that a simple "you may go" from Dalinar shouldn't be enough to set Odium free, however.

[LewsTherinTelescope]

It's heavily implied Odium is bound by a deal. Rayse lumps together the restrictions against harming most people and the binding to the system [RoW 112]:

Quote

"Same, but reversed, if you break the contract. You would be in my power, and the restrictions Honor placed upon me—chaining me to the Rosharan system and preventing me from using my powers on most individuals—would be void."

We recently learned the former is the result of a pact [W&T I-2]:

Quote

“You are forbidden,” Cultivation said, “from taking direct action against any who are not fully given to you.”

“Because of the pact my predecessor made,” he spat. “I can break it.”

We also know that Odium got permission to settle:

Quote

Questioner

It’s really heavily implied in the first Oathbringer letter that the Shards made a pact not to settle near each other. Given that a full half of the Shards ended up doing that, what is the cost for them breaking that oath? You implied earlier that there’s always a cost for Hoid, for taking his protections.

Brandon Sanderson

The wording of those things allows them to agree together, but it also gives them a little bit of power over one another, and you’ve seen the side effects of that on the planets where it’s happened. It has not gone well for any of them, if you kind of run the numbers on that. But the wording of it allows two, later on, to say, "Okay, we both agree." (If one said no and one said yes, then they were in trouble.) This should imply to you that Odium did get permission, as well.

Dragonsteel 2022 (Nov. 14, 2022)

As for what that is, I have some vague guesses but not sure on exact mechanics. The Heralds are apparently "similar" to champions:

Quote

Argent

Are the Heralds champions of Honor in the same way that Tanavast was encouraging Dalinar to force Odium to choose a champion?

Brandon Sanderson

Similar.

JordanCon 2018 (April 22, 2018)

Which, side note, explains what Stormfather says to Gavilar [W&T prologue]:

Quote

“And the owners of these?” he said, gesturing to the Blades. “What did the Heralds believe?”

If they had been entirely truthful, the Stormfather said, then I would not be seeking a new champion.

And Rayse is super salty about Honor keeping its word only in letter [OB 122]:

Quote

"Our word is the contract. I am not some spren of Honor, who seeks to obey only the strictest letter of a promise. If you have an agreement from me, I will keep it in spirit, not merely in word."

So I think Honor got Odium to agree to some kind of contest of their forces, with restrictions on how much they can directly aid either side, but Honor managed to cheat with the Oathpact somehow to keep it going forever, thus why it's "part" of what keeps him bound but the bindings are still "greater" than it. Similar to Preservation's gambit with the prison in a sense.

This might also be part of the "fiddly"ness in the last WoB you quote, if Odium somehow used the agreement (or his perception of Honor violating it) himself to justify the strike.

[alder24]

1 hour ago, CtrlAltDepressed said:

By forcing Odium to remain on Roshar, Honor was breaking the oath he made to the other shards to not settle. Yes, that oath was not official or whatever, but Honor is the shard of Oaths. In addition, he was forcing Odium to break his side of that agreement. I could totally see this being enough to kill Honor. 

This Oath was not a binding oath, it was a suggestion and it was something that Honor already agreed to when Odium came to the Rosharan system for the first time - Honor allowed Odium to settle on Roshar. 

Spoiler

Nameless36

All the Shards basically agreed not to settle on the same planet. Six of them - that we know of - immediately, basically broke that.

Brandon Sanderson

So... they did not make an oath to it. There was a suggestion made... and perhaps the people who made the suggestion did not understand that, if you want the Shards to do something, you need an actual oath. And they did not get one.

Tel Aviv Signing (Oct. 18, 2019)

 

Spoiler

Questioner

It’s really heavily implied in the first Oathbringer letter that the Shards made a pact not to settle near each other. Given that a full half of the Shards ended up doing that, what is the cost for them breaking that oath? You implied earlier that there’s always a cost for Hoid, for taking his protections.

Brandon Sanderson

The wording of those things allows them to agree together, but it also gives them a little bit of power over one another, and you’ve seen the side effects of that on the planets where it’s happened. It has not gone well for any of them, if you kind of run the numbers on that. But the wording of it allows two, later on, to say, "Okay, we both agree." (If one said no and one said yes, then they were in trouble.) This should imply to you that Odium did get permission, as well.

Dragonsteel 2022 (Nov. 14, 2022)

I also don't think Honor needed a Danwshard to trap Odium, just make some Oath and exploid a loophole.

[CtrlAltDepressed]

1 hour ago, alder24 said:

Honor allowed Odium to settle on Roshar

Exactly. 

 

So, forcing him to stay on Roshar may well have been a violation of that agreement. 

[listerfeend]

23 hours ago, CtrlAltDepressed said:

So, forcing him to stay on Roshar may well have been a violation of that agreement. 

I'm not sure I see what you are getting at here. Allowing him to settle and not allowing him to leave seem like either: 2 different agreements, or the same agreement, depending on how that agreement went down. 

"You may settle here, in perpetuity" for instance, could be viewed as an agreement that one can stay somewhere, and never leave. Especially viewed through the context of Rayse' beef with letter of the law vs. spirit:

On 10/24/2024 at 3:01 PM, LewsTherinTelescope said:

"Our word is the contract. I am not some spren of Honor, who seeks to obey only the strictest letter of a promise. If you have an agreement from me, I will keep it in spirit, not merely in word."

Conversely, there could have been two separate agreements, one to allow Odium to settle, and then one binding him to the system. Or the original agreement could have been phrased as a contest in the first place. 

"You must stay here, until such a time as one of our forces dominates the other" or something like that. 

Obviously, we do not have any of the actual wording of whatever agreement was made, just like we don't have the wording for whatever agreement the Shards made about settling with each other. 

As I write this, I think I begin to see maybe what you are getting at here though. Tanavast is dead, somehow. Which indicates a vulnerability. The main way we've been told to make a Shard vulnerable is to get them to break a binding Oath, so perhaps this is what happened to Tanavast. If that is the case, however, I feel like he'd have died long before he actually did. It took Leras 1000 years to fully die, if I'm remembering my timelines from MB era 1 correctly, and Odium has presumably been bound to the system since the First Desolation, at least. Which would have been nearly 6,000 years before he bit the dust. It could be possible that different Vessels or Shards can hold out longer depending on circumstances... Although, I now suspect that Tanavast's death may have had something to do with Aharietiam.

Edited October 25, 2024 by listerfeend