My Final Pre-WaT Predictions

[Confused]

Almost there! I can’t wait to see how truly wrong my predictions are! Please accept everything I say as the purest speculation. I list these predictions in the approximate order I think these events will occur. That’s hard, given how condensed Brandon’s final chapters are. I conclude with my weekly limerick summary.

Battle of the Gods: Wind vs. Honor's Cognitive Shadow

I place this first because I think the Stormfather in his current incarnation is a problem. He holds Honor’s cognitive shadow, a huge concentration of Honor’s Investiture. I think that Investiture has become sapient and seeks to attach itself to the remainder of Honor’s Investiture. Honor’s shadow wants no human Vessel to hold Honor. I think Honor’s shadow subverts the Stormfather. The Stormfather says a self-conscious Shard will hate humans.

Roshar’s old god Wind pushes Kaladin to join Szeth on his Shinovar quest. She claims the contest in the West is as important as the one in the East. I think Wind realizes she must defeat Honor’s shadow in order to reclaim the highstorm and Honor’s perpendicularity. Otherwise, Honor’s shadow and not an unencumbered Stormfather might control the highstorm and perpendicularity at the Contest of Champions.

The Fleet story shows a race between Fleet and “the storm” that Fleet’s challenge precipitates. I think the accepted challenge binds two gods, Wind and Honor’s shadow. The loser will cease as a god. Kal as Fleet prevails, though his body dies. The storm acknowledges Kal’s sacrifice and victory. I believe Honor’s shadow controls the storm until it enters Shinovar.

The WaT epigraphs say both Kal and Szeth are Wind’s champions. Only Kal races the storm. Szeth’s role apparently is to “scour” Shinovar, presumably of the Unmade that now occupies it. I speculate that Unmade’s presence may have helped keep the storm out of Shinovar – the Unmade is of Odium, the storm of Honor. Somehow Ishar is a part of all this, but his and the other herald’s WaT roles are beyond my foresight horizon.

Contest of Champions

I still think the Champions will be the Stormfather and Everstorm. WaT’s back cover portrays Dalinar at the center of two competing ideologies that “as storms, gather to crush the world between their separate dreams...” I believe this statement is literal, not just metaphoric. The two storms will rage around Dalinar until he Ascends and ends the battle as I describe below.

Dalinar, Navani, and Gavinor Jointly Ascend to Honor AND Odium to Form “Unity”

I previously favored the idea of Dalinar becoming Roshar’s Bondsmith, able to wield all 16 Investitures while on that planet. Then Gavinor got sucked into the Spiritual Realm with Dalinar and Navani, and I changed my mind. I think a three-person Vessel of two Shards works in this context – “Unity,” the Shard name Dalinar claims at the Battle of Thaylen Fields.

Dalinar embodies Honor and Odium, passionate order. Navani’s learns from her work with Raboniel how to combine the Shards’ tones into a march of passionate order. Gavinor seeks what every child needs, love and structure – passion and order.

I think Dalinar first Ascends to Honor. After he kills Taravangian, Navani shows him how to merge Odium into Honor. I envision Dalinar encircling his arms around Navani and Gavinor as the Shards merge and seek their joint Vessels.

I think the Contest of Champions ends when Navani engineers the merger, just in the nick of time. Forum lawyers have already told us, a contract where the signatories are the same person leaves no one to enforce it.

Unity will want to remain on Roshar. It is the Kholin home. Unity will continue to be constrained within the Rosharan system, making the other Shards happy.

Dalinar Kills Taravangian

I’ve previously written that Dalinar kills Taravangian when the opposite-direction Everstorm pounds into Kharbranth. The early WoK scene where Taravangian’s granddaughter is trapped by a fallen boulder may foreshadow this event. As the Kharbranth carnage distracts and weakens Taravangian, Dalinar strikes his blow. WaT I-4 shows Taravangian still cares:

Quote

Despite himself, he did feel it. It was the part of Taravangian that loved his daughter and grandchildren. The part of him that had grieved when forced to manipulate Dalinar while trying to break up the coalition. It was the part of Taravangian that remembered being young, uncertain, dull—yearning to do more to help his people.

That was the Taravangian who had been given the chance to have anything he wanted, and had wished for the capacity to stop the coming calamity. In a moment, Taravangian felt as if… as if he were that same man he’d been long ago.

TOdium will never conquer the cosmere. Dalinar kills him first.

El’s “Greater War”

El is a wonderful character who must survive to the Second Five. He is thoughtful, disciplined, forward-looking, and above all, passionate in his desires. He correctly feels TOdium aligns more closely with those desires than ROdium did. El longs for his Greater War. In many ways, El is the Singer version of early Dalinar, a warlord waiting for his master to unleash him.

Let’s assume for fun’s sake that the Family Kholin does Ascend as a triad Vessel. Will they sanction El’s War? Before Dalinar kills him, I believe Taravangian will persuade Dalinar that the cosmere needs saving. When Unity looks outward from Roshar, Dalinar might come to agree with him. It is Unity’s nature to “unite.” But Unity’s three-part Vessel will not agree with Taravangian’s One God strategy.

I speculate Unity will offer “passionate order” to the cosmere. Maybe they’ll first try to establish a religion based on those principles. Unity worshippers will proselytize their religion to whomever is willing to listen. (Unitarianism?) And for those who don’t, they’ll unleash El to enforce their principles. Perhaps Elantris foreshadows the Second Five books: Hrathen comes to convert; Dilaf (El) comes to conquer.

BAM’s Role

I have no idea...though that’s never stopped me from theorizing before. BAM hates humans so much, I can’t see how her release helps them. I doubt she’d even help off-world humans like the Ghostbloods.

The Honor-Odium merger might cause BAM to reclaim her sanity. Under my Unity theory, the merged Shard has three human Vessels. BAM is unlikely to accept them with El’s equanimity toward human Vessels. Without Odium’s approval, BAM was willing to launch the Last Desolation. She won‘t be intimidated by the new Vessels now.

In the end, I think BAM serves one function, to restore Roshar. BAM’s imprisonment did something that affected both Radiantspren and the spren that caused Singer transformations. Perhaps she’s made from so much Investiture and been so long on Roshar, she established her own tones. The Radiants who imprisoned BAM would not have heard them or understood their significance. I think BAM’s release will restore Roshar to its full former magic.

Conclusion and Limerick

Ta-da! If even one of these predictions turns out correct, I will consider it a victory rivaling Fleet’s.

Finally, today’s limerick summary of the two Interludes:

The Rhythm-less Singer called El
And TOdium get along well.
TOd names El the “ruler,”
Sends Dai-Gon, helps fuel her.
Cult’s lessons to TOd slowly gel.

P.S. - I'm gonna miss these weekly sessions with all you folks. Once the book is out, things (for me at least) change. I wish all of you the very best! C.

Edited December 5, 2024 by Confused

[OoklaApologist She/her]

1 hour ago, Confused said:

I speculate that Unmade’s presence may have helped keep the storm out of Shinovar – the Unmade is of Odium, the storm of Honor.

Interesting. I wonder what impact a highstorm blowing through Shinovar would have

1 hour ago, Confused said:

I have no idea...though that’s never stopped me from theorizing before. BAM hates humans so much, I can’t see how her release helps them. I doubt she’d even help off-world humans like the Ghostbloods.

Is it possible that the Ghostbloods want the closed gem? For example, would they want it to experiment with bringing entities invested in a specific system to another? Something else? 

1 hour ago, Confused said:

P.S. - I'm gonna miss these weekly sessions with all you folks. Once the book is out, things (for me at least) change. I wish all of you the very best! C.

I'll miss it too! There's so many things that I wouldn't have noticed without people on the Shard pointing it out