What Happens to Fabrial-Imprisoned Spren When the Gemstone Breaks?

[Confused]

I want to thank Moogle for sparking the idea of this post. He reminds us here that fabrials are Stormlight-infused gemstones containing (imprisoning) certain spren. He and Seloun have an interesting discussion about what such fabrials can do.

 

Here is the idea:

 

• The spren inside fabrials have as much investiture as Radiant spren. Otherwise, they could not direct power like Radiant spren do. (Anecdotally this is true: the foodmakers and builders both seem to wield powers much like Lift and what I imagine Stonewards can do.)
• When you look at what fabrials do, in each case they are identical to the Surges. Seloun asks “What is the spren for lack of pain?” The answer is, the one that began its bond with Ym. That’s what that spren did for the boy with the sore foot.
• Power needs a mind to direct it. That means the device to which the gemstone is attached somehow communicates to the spren how it wants the power to be used. The spren is bonded to the fabrial user through the device, doing what the user asks of it. Just like those Radiant spren do who are bonded to KR. The device substitutes for the Nahel bond.

 

My topic question, then, is what happens to the spren when the gemstone breaks? The answer must be that the spren fly free. These spren are bits of cognitive investiture that have been bonded, and now their bond, however tenuous, has been broken. Do they become “dead” like the Recreance spren?

 

I speculate they are just like Radiant spren. For some period of time, they will float on a consciousness consisting of mere sentience. (Like Syl when she was a windspren.) But like Syl, they will search for a mind that can direct their power.

 

These spren ARE Radiant Spren and form the pool available to bond with new Knights Radiant!

 

That’s what I think will happen to them, anyway…

[Moogle]

Just to clarify, are you referring to the Surgebinding fabrials (ie. Soulcasters, Regrowth fabrials as probably seen with Nalan/Stoneward in TWoK) which don't seem to have spren trapped in gemstones (because the gems are replaceable on such devices) or the more modern creations by Navani and co. which seem to actually trap spren in gemstones?

 

I think you're referring to the latter, and as such I'm curious as to what your explanation is for the former and how you differentiate the two kinds.

[Oudeis he/him]

Yeah... clock fabrials, for example, don't seem to mimick a Surge, nor does the one that draws water, or spanreeds...

 

I'm pretty sure the spren trapped in something that reduces pain is just a painspren, and the fabrial causes that trait to diminish, and when the fabrial breaks the spren simply goes wherever flamespren go when the fire is doused.

[Confused]

My topic is not so much the nature of fabrials (although I needed to address that in the OP) as it is trying to figure out what happens to spren when fabrial gemstones break, as they often do. Hence, I'm only talking about gemstone/spren fabrials.

 

Brandon's talked about the large number of splinters on Roshar. But where are they? It's possible they're lurking in other countries or have not yet transitioned to the Physical Realm. I'm suggesting that many future Radiant spren will come from broken fabrials.

 

In answer to your question, Moogle, I can only guess. I've always liked the explanation that the glyphs on older fabrials are Stormlight batteries. Perhaps they also are symbols of the "divine language." (I'm making this up as I go along, but I do note that glyphs on other planets look equally exotic and strange.) If so, the glyphs may constitute directions to the Stormlight how to execute whatever Surge is involved. The human user simply turns it on or off as needed. IOW, the glyphs give direction instead of the fabrial user, since there is no spren for the user to bond with.

 

Oudeis, I believe the Truthwatchers - holding 100% Cultivation's investiture, if the KR chart can be trusted - have the ability to see the future and possibly affect time in other ways. The Surge that permits the Truthwatchers to deal with time (Progression?) is probably the same one clock fabrials rely on. Drawing water might be adhesion or whatever the "surface tension" Surge became.

 

Painspren are sentient, not sapient spren like Radiant spren. They just reflect the pain sentient beings feel. They do not hold enough investiture to make a fabrial work. Broken fabrial gemstone spren ("BFGS"?) fly free just like a flamespren. But they will forever do so unless they find a sapient being to bond to (like Syl and Pattern did). A BFGS's capacity to bond with a sapient being (unlike a flamespren) is what enables them to be Radiant spren.

[mortalcoil]

Well uhm . . . arent spanreeds/the amethysts for the floating siege tower purposely broken gems? Wouldnt this imply that if a spren is bound in a fabrial its permanently bound?

[natc]

And yet Eshonai enters stormform just by smashing the gem into the floor to shatter it, and the stormspren is simply released. Presumably it works for their other forms too, since they now seem to exclusively use gems instead of trying to attract the spren in the middle of a highstorm like an idiot.

[Edgedancer he/him]

So do you mean to say that they transform into a new type of Spren, like a Windspren into an Honorspren, and that these Sprens based on more complex concepts aren't created "naturally" or do you mean that these Spren just so happen to pose an alternative to the known Nahel Spren that a person could bond with and somehow get the same result?

[Oudeis he/him]

My topic is not so much the nature of fabrials (although I needed to address that in the OP) as it is trying to figure out what happens to spren when fabrial gemstones break, as they often do. Hence, I'm only talking about gemstone/spren fabrials.

 

Brandon's talked about the large number of splinters on Roshar. But where are they? It's possible they're lurking in other countries or have not yet transitioned to the Physical Realm. I'm suggesting that many future Radiant spren will come from broken fabrials.

 

In answer to your question, Moogle, I can only guess. I've always liked the explanation that the glyphs on older fabrials are Stormlight batteries. Perhaps they also are symbols of the "divine language." (I'm making this up as I go along, but I do note that glyphs on other planets look equally exotic and strange.) If so, the glyphs may constitute directions to the Stormlight how to execute whatever Surge is involved. The human user simply turns it on or off as needed. IOW, the glyphs give direction instead of the fabrial user, since there is no spren for the user to bond with.

 

Oudeis, I believe the Truthwatchers - holding 100% Cultivation's investiture, if the KR chart can be trusted - have the ability to see the future and possibly affect time in other ways. The Surge that permits the Truthwatchers to deal with time (Progression?) is probably the same one clock fabrials rely on. Drawing water might be adhesion or whatever the "surface tension" Surge became.

 

Painspren are sentient, not sapient spren like Radiant spren. They just reflect the pain sentient beings feel. They do not hold enough investiture to make a fabrial work. Broken fabrial gemstone spren ("BFGS"?) fly free just like a flamespren. But they will forever do so unless they find a sapient being to bond to (like Syl and Pattern did). A BFGS's capacity to bond with a sapient being (unlike a flamespren) is what enables them to be Radiant spren.

 

So, I'm not going to address every single point you make here, apart from reminding people reading this that, despite your very confident tone, almost everything you say here is flagrant speculation and personal interpretation. I'm going to address specifically your comments on the Surgebinding Chart. It's not a matter of if the chart can be trusted; the chart probably can (for all that it's an in-universe creation). However the information you're getting out of it is entirely something fans have made up. It might actually prove to be true, but nothing canon supports it as more than complete speculation. Yet, people have stated it confidently, as though it's a thing that actually is true, and we end up with a post like this basing hypothesis on an assumption. I just want to throw out a caveat to people; if you think there's some evidence for this idea and if you even want to build off of it, that's great, but do not do so on the assumption that this is solid fact.

 

And one other thing; I'm a little confused, or perhaps you are. You say that you're not talking about the Surge "fabrials," you're talking about modern fabrials like heating or warning (which also I don't think have Surge correlations) but your first examples are "foodmakers and builders" which are both references to Soulcasters, which are not Stormlight and spren fabrials.

 

And one last inconsistency; you say that painspren cannot possibly be part of pain fabrials because they don't have enough Investiture. Surely the Stormlight provides the Investiture? If it came from the spren, why would we need Stormlight at all?

[Confused]

Every time I write here I realize the deficiency of words. I'm reminded of that old Gloria Estefan song: "The Words Get in the Way." I find I do a poor job of explaining myself, given your reactions. (An old study concludes that 55% of the meaning of speech is conveyed through body language; 38% through vocal tone; and only 7% through the words themselves! The cellphone TV ads showing a mother and daughter screaming at each other, venomous expressions on their faces, but actually SAYING "Thanks" and "I love you," prove the point.) But I will soldier on, trying to find words that express my meaning, knowing I'm only communicating 7% of what I want to...

 

Natc: Exactly! Eshonai smashed the gemstone, the stormspren was released, AND BONDED WITH HER. Her gem wasn't a fabrial though, and stormspren don't (I believe) hold as much investiture as a Radiant spren. But same concept.

 

Edgedancer: No, this is not a "new" type of spren. It is exactly the same spren as a Radiant spren that has the same Surge capabilities. One spren exercises its power through a device, the other through a KR. If the gemstone breaks, the spren is free to bond with a proto-KR. That's the point of the OP.

 

Oudeis: First, thank you for your compliment of my tone! I've observed that "leadership" stems from two things: if you're confident, people will believe you. If you're also enthusiastic, people will want to follow you. So thanks for noticing! (Btw, Is your Forum name intended to be pronounced "Odious"?)

 

Of course my post is speculation and interpretation. EVERY POST in these forums is speculative. This wouldn't be much fun If we KNEW what's really going on. The speculation isn't wholly from my head, though. There are analytic and logical consistency reasons (at least with other of my theories) why I propose what I do. "Theorizing" is about applying some kind of unifying framework to known facts. I view our postings as scorecards against which to measure future story developments. (We only have 2 of 10 books. Given Brandon's history of pouring most of the exposition into the last part of the last book, that means we have well fewer than 20% of the facts.) Time and the Progression Surge will tell...

 

Others have advised me not to make "throwaway" comments - ones unnecessary to the argument - because of their tendency to attract nitpickers. (I'm not suggesting YOU are. Just that that tends to happen, distracting attention from the main points. The fault is mine for putting unnecessary comments out there. Just can't help myself...) My point, Oudeis, is that the Surgebinding chart comment is completely irrelevant to the argument. I shouldn't have made it in the first place. You are correct in pointing out that the chart's interpretation is not "canon."

 

But I have fairly high "confidence" (sorry) that Truthwatchers affect time somehow. That's based on an interpretation of the handwriting on the wall ("Mene, mene, tekel, upharsin" [sp?] - "Your days are numbered" - Book of Daniel) that Renarin sees the future. We also know that seeing the future is something Cultivation is good at. I have previously theorized that the Shards all have the same powers, but express them differently because of their mandates (intents) and unique planetary/Shard interactions. We know that "time bubbles" exist on Scadrial. All of this points to a Rosharan ability to affect time, as I speculate.

 

Yes, Confusion is my normal state. (If you're not "Confused," you're not thinking.) I'm not going through each and every fabrial type to determine whether this theory works on any specific type. That's irrelevant to the point. If not every fabrial uses a spren and gemstone, fine. All I'm saying is that, with respect to those fabrials that DO use a spren and gemstone, when the gemstone breaks, the spren inside may be able to bond with a proto-KR, supplying a source of future Radiant spren.

 

Oudeis, I have a lot of respect for your analytical rigor and your writing (even if sometimes you can be a bit grumpy). But here you missed an important FACT: Spren ARE investiture. That's ALL they are. They are bits of cognitive investiture, carrying with them the capacity to direct power (hence "cognitive").

 

We all "know" (just being epistemological here) that there are “gradations” of spren, depending on how much investiture comprises them There is a direct relationship between the amount of investiture and the level of consciousness of the holder. This rule applies to spren, to humans and even Shards – both Vin and Sazed experience a much broader consciousness when they acquire the mists and the Shards, respectively. Sazed’s expanded consciousness exceeds Vin’s, commensurate with their respective power levels.

 

The reason is that “consciousness” to power is simply the ability to direct its exercise. It is not “thoughts and personalities.” Power just wants someone to wield it. Realmatic theory also helps explain this – if all things exist in three realms, then greater power theoretically comes with expanded “consciousness,” all other things being equal.

 

Painspren consist of only enough investiture to "cause" (or be associated with) feeling, not to direct any power. That requires more investiture, which means a higher order spren, a splinter-sized spren like a Radiant spren. Stormlight is the additional investiture that must be added to effectuate the state change that magic involves. (Like adding heat to melt ice.) It's no different than when Kaladin infuses Stormlight to create magic even though he already has Syl.

 

All good questions. Hopefully I provided clearer answers, But words really do get in the way...

Edited August 17, 2015 by Confused

[Edgedancer he/him]

Edgedancer: No, this is not a "new" type of spren. It is exactly the same spren as a Radiant spren that has the same Surge capabilities. One spren exercises its power through a device, the other through a KR. If the gemstone breaks, the spren is free to bond with a proto-KR. That's the point of the OP.

So the point of your argument is not that the breaking of the gemstone changes anything about the Spren but that some Fabrials might use Radiant Spren, which will only be able to bond a specific person after they are no longer in a gemstone?

[Oudeis he/him]

Oudeis is Greek, and somewhat difficult to write out phonetically. Roughly, it's pronounced "oh-days" though the vowel sounds in English do not map exactly to the vowels of Greek.