Shallans Third Truth and Pattern Shardblade

[asanti021]

How was Shallan able to summon Pattern as a shardblade in the chasm if she didn't say her third truth until later in WOR (I killed my mother). Was the shardblade in the chasm Testament? but how could it change shape? 

[Through the Living Hopper He/Him]

1 hour ago, asanti021 said:

How was Shallan able to summon Pattern as a shardblade in the chasm if she didn't say her third truth until later in WOR (I killed my mother). Was the shardblade in the chasm Testament? but how could it change shape? 

Welcome! Please consider an Intro Post to let us what you have or haven't read (whatever list is shorter)!

It is my belief that Testament — yes, it was Testament — was able to change shape because Shallan was still bonded to her, and Brandon has said that deadeye blades bonded to their original owners can do some freaky stuff.

I can't find the exact WOB, because Arcanum's search feature is storming useless. However, Treamayne is going to show up in a few minutes, so it's okay.

Edit: looked a little more: these are pretty tentative, though.

Spoiler

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Questioner

Shardblades are essentially spren that have died--

Brandon Sanderson

Not all of them have died but yeah.

Questioner

Oh, my question was if they could be revived?

Brandon Sanderson

Um this… According to the understanding of those in-world it would require the same person who broke their oath. So it would be possible if any of them were still alive. I'm not ruling out other ways, but that's how it's understood by--

Questioner

It would be the traditional way.

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, mmhmm.

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/6/#e293

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Marlon Pastor Barrantes Del Castillo

How did Shallan open the Oathgate with a deadeye spren in the second book?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO! That's all on that same sort of thing. Be asking yourself these questions.

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/452/#e14558

 

 

 

 

Edited October 7, 2025 by ThatOneWorldhopper

[Treamayne]

Welcome to the Shard. Please consider an Intro Post to let us know what you have or have-not read (whichever list is shorter). Also, please consider checking out the Sharder FAQ for some useful forum info and tips. 

4 hours ago, asanti021 said:

How was Shallan able to summon Pattern as a shardblade in the chasm if she didn't say her third truth until later in WOR (I killed my mother). Was the shardblade in the chasm Testament? but how could it change shape? 

How far have you read into Stormlight Archive? Spoilers for RoW and WaT:

Spoiler

The Shardblade that Shallan loaned Kaladin is the Testament Blade - foreshadowed by the scene where "Shallan" distracts the Chasmfiend. 
WoR Ch 72:

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The chasmfiend trumped and—

“Hey! Hey!”

Kaladin twisted about. Shallan? What was that fool woman doing, standing in the chasm, waving her hands like a maniac? How had she even gotten past him?

She yelled again, getting the chasmfiend’s attention. Her voice echoed oddly.

<snip>

The chasmfiend crashed down, chitin snapping, legs spasming. Shallan cried out, freehand to mouth, from where she hid behind a boulder, her skin and clothing turned deep black.

The chasmfiend had fallen on Kaladin.

At this point, Shallan could only make a moving illusion without her being near if it was "attached" to Pattern. So, If kaladin has a Shardblade and Pattern is carrying an Illusion Shallan distraction while Shallan is hiding in the Bloulder-Shadow illusion - then the Shardbalde must be Testamant. 

 

WoBs:

Spoiler

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macros

Based on what we know currently about ten heartbeats, why does Szeth require ten heartbeats to bring forth his Honorblade?

Brandon Sanderson

Perception is a very important part of how these things all work, and remember the Honorblades work differently from everything else. Everything was based upon them. Why don't you read and find out what's going on there, but remember that the characters's perception is very important.

macros

So then that's why at one point Shallan requires ten heartbeats and now she doesn't?

Brandon Sanderson

Right, it's the exact same reason that Kaladin's forehead wounds don't heal. Because he views himself as having those somewhere deep inside of him and he can't heal until that gets away. And it works for the same reason why in Warbreaker when you bring something to life, your intention rather than really what you say is what matters. It's all about perception.

Words of Radiance Philadelphia signing (March 21, 2014)

Showing Shallan never needed 10 heartbeats, because she still has a Bond with Testament - whereas true Deadeyes are "bonded" through the pommel gem
WoR Ch 67:

Spoiler

“Yes. If this is true, it means the Blades aren’t powered by the stones. Credit goes to Rushu, who asked why a Shardblade can be summoned and dismissed even if its gemstone has gone dun. We had no answers, and she spent the last few weeks in contact with Kharbranth, using one of those new information stations. She came up with a scrap from several decades after the Recreance which talks about men learning to summon and dismiss Blades by adding gemstones to them, an accident of ornamentation it seems.”

The Gem creates a false bond with the Shardbearer - and that is what links the Heartbeats to the summoning of the blade. 

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Adontis

I've always wondered, how do you determine where the line between "Word of Brandon" and "Read and Find Out" is? Has it ever caused issues where you've said something, but later that thing changed when it went into a book making your first statement now false?

Thanks so much for writing as much as you do, I'm looking forward to all your upcoming books, keep up the great work!

Brandon Sanderson

Boy, this one is an art, not a science.

I've several times said something that I later decided to change in a book. I've always got this idea in the back of my head that the books are canon, and things I say at signing aren't 100% canon. This is part because of a habit I have of falling back on things I decided years ago, then revised in notes after I realized they didn't work. My off-the-cuff instinct is still to go with what I had in my head for years, even when it's no longer canon.

An example of this are Shardblades. In the first draft of TWoK in 2002, I had the mechanics of the weapons work in a specific way. (If you wanted to steal one from someone, you knock off the bonding gemstone, and it breaks the bond.) I later decided it was more dramatic if you couldn't steal a Shardblade that way--you had to kill the person or force them to relinquish the bond. It worked far better.

But in Oathbringer, Peter had to remind me of that change, as I just kind of nonchalantly wrote into a scene a comment about knocking off a gemstone to steal a Shardblade. These things leak back in, as you might expect for a series I've been working on for some twenty years now--with lore being revised all along.

So...short answer...yes, I've contradicted myself a number of times. I try very, very hard to let the books be the canon however. So you can default to them.

As for what I answer and what I RAFO...it depends on how much I want to reveal at the moment, if I'm trying to preserve specific surprises, or if I just want people to focus on other things at the moment. Like I said, art and not science.

damenleeturks

In WoR, Navani muses to Dalinar about how the gemstones in the Blades could be the focus that allows the bond with the Blade to exist. If this theory is correct, it would follow that someone could damage that gemstone and thus be able to steal the Blade with it then having no intact bonding mechanism, right?

I guess I'm having trouble seeing how the example you describe isn't possible.

Peter Ahlstrom

The gemstone is needed to create the bond and operate the bond's functions. If you remove the gemstone, the person the sword is bonded to can't summon it or dismiss it to mist. But neither can anyone else. If they eventually pop another gemstone in and try to bond it themselves, they will fail, and the original person can then resummon their Blade. The bond is with the dead spren of the Blade, not with the gemstone. The stone facilitates the bond.

So, you can haul around a de-gemstoned Blade with you all the time and successfully steal it that way. But this makes it very easy to steal back. You'd have to kill the holder of the bond in order to rebond it. Which is no different from usual.

And in general, if you can get close enough to a Shardbearer to steal their Blade, you are also close enough to kill them anyway.

Phantine

So that scene where Dalinar crushes the gemstone and hands the Shardblade over, he's also doing some sort of mystical de-bonding?

Or is it just 'if you WANT to give it up, you gave it up'?

Peter Ahlstrom

Yes, if you want to give it up, you gave it up.

Phantine

If nobody is currently bonded to it, does the attuning still take a week?

Otherwise it seems weird people would figure out putting a gemstone in hilt lets you summon it, since nothing would happen without a week of bonding time.

ricree

Not that weird. One of the books (WoK, I think) mentions that many years passed before the gemstone bonding was discovered. Shardblades were still really valuable, though, and even more vulnerable to theft, so it makes sense that people would have kept them close at hand long enough for the bonding process.

Other than that, all you need is someone to accidentally decorate the blade correctly, which is something that took a long time to happen, but was probably bound to happen eventually considering how key infused gemstones are to the world.

Peter Ahlstrom

Well said.

/r/fantasy AMA 2017 (Feb. 10, 2017)

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RIT

So, my question is glowing Shardplate and retractable helmets. Is that a similar origin of the Shardblades—

Brandon Sanderson

There's a similarity, but they are also very different.

RIT

Yeah, I noticed they do seem like advanced fabrials, because Adolin just keeps going on and on about how they're all interchangeable and they all feel comfortable after a while, and it doesn't have the same kind of thing with the Shardblades.

Brandon Sanderson

No, it doesn't. Though a Shardblade, used for a long time, will change shape slightly.

Words of Radiance Philadelphia signing (March 21, 2014)

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Questioner

So, if a person claims a new set of Shardplate, and there's a difference in size between the new wielder and the previous wielder, does it adjust to the size of the new wielder?

Brandon Sanderson

It does... And there are things they can do to size it and things like that. But it slowly changes over time, like a Blade sometimes does under certain circumstances.

Oathbringer San Francisco signing (Nov. 15, 2017)

Even Deadeye blades can change, but much more limited and much slower

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Dr Bonko 360

Is there a difference between the way that Shallan 'broke' her bond with Testament and the way that the rest of the Radiants broke their bonds in the Recreance that allowed Shallan to use Surgebinding between her bonds with Testament and Pattern?

Brandon Sanderson

Kind of and kind of not. I mean the thing about it is, some of the things that are happening with Shallan could've happened in the past and probably did, but it's been so long ago that it's not really relevant. So it's less like she's done something super unique and more like things that are happening with Shallan also probably happened—not with everybody but with some—but there's just not record of it and it's not as relevant to the conversation. So, less that she's special and more that this is a possibility. Not giving any confirmations to any specific items, just saying what is happening with Shallan could theoretically have happened in the past and probably did.

YouTube Spoiler Stream 4 (June 16, 2022)

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Kaymyth

So, Kalak comments that Shallan is able to draw on Fortune because she has two Nahel bonds. Is this truly what's going on or is it instead because she is the daughter of a Herald or is it maybe a mixture of both? 

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, definitely some mixture going on there and some unique Resonances going on with Shallan. I would say anyone who is trying to theorize in world about what is going on with Shallan, they don't like, it's a pretty unique case and they are spitballing, maybe poorly. Whether it's Hoid or anyone else. Weird stuff is going on with Shallans spiritweb and it is causing all sorts of fun for me.

Shardcast Interview (May 25, 2025)

 

The Sunlit Man will also have information on this topic 

3 hours ago, ThatOneWorldhopper said:

I can't find the exact WOB, because Arcanum's search feature is storming useless.

The Sharder FAQ has tips on how to search Arcanum - but, yes, knowing or intuiting the best keywords to search helps a lot. 

Hope that helps