Singer gemhearts

[Nitpicking]

When Adolin is fighting Abidi the Monarch as the first of the Unoathed, he crushes the Fused's gemheart. But ... did the Alethi know about Singer gemhearts? I thought it was something they were totally unaware of. And Yanagawm (whose point of view we're inhabiting) also seems to know. Am I just remembering wrong?

Maybe Maya told him through their thoughtspeech, of course.

[Treamayne]

11 hours ago, Nitpicking said:

When Adolin is fighting Abidi the Monarch as the first of the Unoathed, he crushes the Fused's gemheart. But ... did the Alethi know about Singer gemhearts? I thought it was something they were totally unaware of. And Yanagawm (whose point of view we're inhabiting) also seems to know. Am I just remembering wrong?

Maybe Maya told him through their thoughtspeech, of course.

Kaladin mentions aiming to kill Fused by striking the gemheart back in RoW Ch 2:

Spoiler

That was enough. Kaladin swept his hand at the thing’s neck, Syl forming as a side sword. Cut through the gemheart, the head, or the neck with a Blade, and—great powers notwithstanding—the Fused would die.

There was a year between Oathbringer and RoW - so they learned about this offscreen - either just through experience during the war, from some of Dalinar's offscreen visions (since we know there were over a dozen and only a few were shown on-screen), or (possibly) from Rlain.

Adolin even remarked on the Gemhearts earlier, (Day 3 and 7)

Spoiler

Fighting the Shanay-im in the Dome (Ch 40)

Adolin spun toward something he’d barely seen at the corner of his vision. He struck by instinct, and his Blade became longer by a few inches and speared straight through another flying Heavenly One—this one not on fire—her lance scraping across his armor and deflecting off.

Maya cut the gemheart inside the Fused, and that was enough. The creature’s eyes burned, same as any other singer, and she tumbled to the ground.

when checking Taln's path of destruction (Ch 85)

He could feel a lingering heat radiating from that hole, but that hadn’t reached these Fused outside. He counted eight separate varieties here—dead, tens of them. Their gemhearts crushed, their chests having been either ripped open or smashed. Storms. What could do something like this to the enemy’s most elite fighters?

 

Gemheart WoB:

Spoiler

Questioner

I was wondering, in Stormlight, what kind of gem the [singer] gemhearts were, or do they just, do they hold Stormlight well?

Brandon Sanderson

So, this is a good question. This is one that people have been asking me since the first book, if they had one, and I've finally kind of confirmed it in book three. So the reason people don't think [singers] have a gemheart is it is milky white, and looks like bone.

Questioner

But aren't their bones red?

Brandon Sanderson

Their bones, well-- Their bones are red-- not completely. If you're going to pull out the bone, what you're going to see-- I'll explain it in the next book. So what you're going to do is, if you break open the bone, you're going to find this white-- It's not marrow but it is, yeah I guess it's marrow. Anyway at the center kind of in their sternum there is a gemheart there, but it is fused to the bone and it is grown into the bone, and you have to kind of snap it open and find it inside, and it kind of just looks like marrow, but there's a gemheart in there. And it kind of relates to some stuff in Dragonsteel that I'm not gonna get into. But you'll see in the next books. But there's a good reason people just don't think that [singers] have a gemheart. 

Questioner

So they must not glow much then, I'm assuming.

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, well, it's surrounded by bone. So it's a different special thing. We'll bring it out in the following books. It might not be the next one.

Emerald City Comic Con 2018 (March 1, 2018)

Hope that helps.

Edited December 21, 2024 by Treamayne
SPAG

[alder24]

20 hours ago, Nitpicking said:

When Adolin is fighting Abidi the Monarch as the first of the Unoathed, he crushes the Fused's gemheart. But ... did the Alethi know about Singer gemhearts? I thought it was something they were totally unaware of. And Yanagawm (whose point of view we're inhabiting) also seems to know. Am I just remembering wrong?

Maybe Maya told him through their thoughtspeech, of course.

At this point they all knew it. In OB ch 79, during the Kholinar siege, Kaladin killed one Fused by striking his gemheart, but back then he didn't know about them. However, I think they were talking about that somewhere in books, maybe with Rlain, if not they talked about it off-screen since OB. 

Quote

Kaladin! Syl’s voice, in his head. I sense something … something about its power. Cut upward, toward the heart.
The city, the battle, the sky—all became a blur. Kaladin forced his Blade farther into the creature’s chest, pushing it upward, seeking …
The Shardknife struck something brittle and hard.
The Fused’s red eyes winked out.

OB ch 120:

Quote

Those could heal unless you stabbed them in exactly the right spot in the sternum, and he’d missed.
[...]
That impaled the Fused dropping down to attack him, cracking its sternum within, causing its eyes to burn.