Could The Nahel Bond Be Insidious? (WoR Back Cover)

[Subvisual Haze]

There's a pretty ominous blurb on the back cover of Words of Radiance, that I think might point to a darker effect of the Nahel Bond.  I have two theories on what this could mean (which specific one is right I have no clue), but I think we would be naive in assuming the Nahel Bond is a purely positive experience for the recipient.

"Men seek what was lost; I fear the quest will destroy them.

It is the nature of the magic.  A broken soul has cracks into which something else can be fit. Surgebindings, the power of creation themselves; they can brace a broken soul, but they can also widen its fissures"

That sounds dark enough by itself, but it gets even more uncomfortable when comparing this to a familiar cosmere magical system (it sounds uncomfortably similar to how a hemalurgic spike cracks open a person's soul to invite outside influence or control).  The imagery of cracked souls matches what we've been told so far in Stormlight Archive.  Knights Radiant of the past according to Syl were all "broken" people.  Being a broken person with a damaged soul seems like a pre-req for spren to be able to form a bond with humans.  Indeed (from what we've observed so far), it is frequently only in moments of great psychological stress that the bond between spren and human can be strengthened. This seems like a full boon for our heroic knight, as they gain awesome powers for seemingly no cost.  But what if there is a cost?

1) Loss of Free Will Every oath the knight speaks, the tighter their bond with their spren grows.  Using the existing cracked soul analogy, one can picture the spren plugging the cracks in the human's soul to make them spiritually whole again (almost like a filling in a tooth cavity).  But a more insidious way of seeing this is that the knight's soul is becoming less and less their own, and more and more their spren's.  Each oath the knight swears, the more of their soul is bound up with their spren, the more spren-like they become.  What's more, this isn't restoring the knight's soul, but only covering up the cracks (with a cover that can be later taken away).    Sure swearing those oaths grants you more power, but it also forces you to live your life according to a very strict set of rules.  At what point does fear about breaking those rules deprive a human radiant of their free will?  At what point do they stop being a human struggling to embrace an ideal, and become just an ideal?

I think Kaladin's dark night of the soul at the end of WOR is a poignant example of this.  Because he swore conflicting oaths, his power left him, reverting him into his sad pre-Radiant state: chronically depressed, full of pain, and discovering that even skills he thought he had earned on his own (gracefulness with spear) were really only gifts granted by his spren bond.  It is only by surrendering to the oaths previously sworn that Kaladin could become a functional human being again.  Syl said she didn't want to force Kaladin to do the right thing, but functionally that is exactly what she did!  Remembering the shock of his non-Radiant state, Kaladin will likely have something approaching panic disorder if he approaches future oath violations.  Again, remember that all Radiants are damaged people.  What if they all lived in chronic anxiety of breaking their oaths and reverting to being a non-magical mess again?  And what about the addictive nature of stormlight consumption?  Would such a constant stress to obey oaths, without the immediate need of a Desolation, be enough to jumpstart the Reacreance?  Possibly!

2) I'm cursed - Kaladin makes some repeated ruminations that his continued survival while others fall is a sign that he is cursed.  Syl dismisses this as nonsense, and it is our first impulse as readers to just pass this off as Survivor's Guilt on Kaladin's part.  But what if he has a kernel of truth there?  In Mistborn Secret History we have an interesting scene where Kelsier's shadow is trying to chase Vin around.  Preservation loans some power to Kelsier, which temporarily strengthens him, but Ruin quickly responds by crushing Kelsier with mental force.  Once Preservation gives up and withdraws his power from Kelsier, Kel notices that Ruin also can no longer restrain him as effectively.  I think this was Brandon giving us a clue that competing shards often work in balance of one another, and one shard expanding their power on a human quickly draws the jealous attention of their enemy.  What if a similar situation is at play on Roshar?  A whole lot of incredibly unpleasant stuff is done to Kaladin and Shallan by the people around them in their life.  What if this wasn't just plot convenience?  What if Pattern and Syl starting to grant access to power to Kaladin and Shallan shines a spotlight on them for Odium and causes Odium to influence people nearby them to do a heaping of bad stuff in an attempt to break their spirit?  It seems awfully coincidental that both of their lives went to hell after their spren first started to observe/bond them.  Maybe the Radiants of the past got tired of spren inviting tragic events onto their chosen knights and decided to abandon their oaths as a result?  There might be a sort of magical reciprocity at play.

[1stBondsmith]

Well spoken! Have an upvote for insight and articulation. Hmmm...This might put a different spin on the Stormfather's reluctance to make new Knights, or to Change the forms of the Listeners. Not just a bitter spren, but knowing what price it will exact of the humans later. It is hard to say which is worse, having the breaking of our spirit remain, or hanving a patch which might lead you to do differently than you would want. Who would trade becoming a superhero for less individual control? Quite an exchange. 

I think I agree with most of what you wrote. The only reservation I have about going all in is, to what extent is following ideals a lack of individual will? and what will that make them susceptible to later? Can a person act with total free will because the oaths are part of who they are, and not limited by them? I have made oaths of this very kind. I made them of my free will, and will keep them by my free will. I am not limited, I have just articulated what I will do based on a principle or moral value.

There is enough information now to make your theory very likely. I like it, but holding back just a little to see further down the road. It could be that seeking the Radiant powers brings the voidbringers power as well. We will have to see.

Edited October 11, 2016 by 1stBondsmith
spelling

[Argel]

Regarding the Loss of Free Will section: Kaladin felt betrayed by the Lighteyes because of how he was treated after Adolin's duel. That brought up many past memories of betrayal and stoked his hatred of Lighteyes, and that hatred/prejudice led to him wanting to murder instead of protect. The consequence of that shift in Kaladin is what broke the bond. This section really doesn't work for me at all, because we have PoVs from Kaladin that do not show it happening this way and have no real reason to believe there is some mastery level manipulation going on, when Kaladin's prejudices cover everything that happened just fine as is.

[Capt. Goradel]

The Loss of free will part was really interesting. In the bond a spren becomes more human-like, it seems reasonable to say that it would make a human more spren-like. Each order has such strict beliefs that are very static and allow very little character complexity for the "perfect" knight. 

Like you said, this could change our perspective of the Recreance from a act of betrayal to one of desperation, as if that was their only way to escape their oaths that became progressively more restrictive.

[Argel]

How does the Recreance even happen if they have lost their free will? We're not talking about proto-KRs back then, but experienced KRs, which according to this theory would have the least amount of free will left.

[The One Who Connects]

17 hours ago, Argel said:

How does the Recreance even happen if they have lost their free will? We're not talking about proto-KRs back then, but experienced KRs, which according to this theory would have the least amount of free will left.

The way I understood the idea is that you are basically bribed into acting a certain way. Do this thing/say these words/live this lifestyle, you get to have powers. If you don't do what the bond wants, you get nothing. Actually, that's basic employer/employee relations... I need to reread the topic again.

I see the idea of losing free will in the sense of losing the willingness/capacity to choose. The psychological want/need for Surgebinding powers overwrites the natural mental resistance to being coerced. Your lifestyle choices are restricted to fit within a narrow set of Ideals, and resisting this prevents you from getting your Stormlight Fix.

The Recreance occurs even with loss of free wil because people eventually snap under pressure. Insidious or not, the Nahel Bond does force you to adhere to a certain lifestyle. Its a pretty good lifestyle all things considered and the benefits of Surgebinding are rather impressive, but we as humans can eventually tire of anything. We grow curious about what we are not allowed to do (teenagers and their "rebel" phase) Nothing seeks to transcend/escape limits more than a curious mind.

Disclaimer: I do not actually think the Nahel Bond is purposefully insidious, but I do see how the argument could be made.

[VirtuousTraveller]

On 10/11/2016 at 5:52 PM, 1stBondsmith said:

Hmmm...This might put a different spin on the Stormfather's reluctance to make new Knights

Yes...but how does Tanavast/Honor's combined consciousness with the Stormfather play into this reluctance?  Perhaps we're misreading stormlight as Honor's investiture (not the first time this idea has been suggested).  Maybe Odium is what fuels Stormlight?

Also, remember that like the KR and the Recreance, the Sunmaker likewise challenged widely accepted "divine truths/visions" rather dramatically.  I wonder what this great secret is!

[Jondesu]

I would bet that no Radiants lived long enough to have the pressures of that build up enough to cause them to snap like they did in the Recreance, if this theory is true, before the last Desolation (I didn't capitalize Last because it's not true ).  If they lose some of their freedom to act, or perhaps if they even discovered that there was some final step that would take their humanity completely away from them, I can see that causing the Recreance, and then the only reason it wouldn't have happened before is that there was always a Desolation looming that would kill off a lot of the Radiants and also distract them from what was happening so they couldn't figure it out.

jW

[Farnsworth]

It doesn't necessarily have to be an insidious act, even if the spren becomes part of you. These people are broken, and they already have a certain disposition that attracts the spren. For example, Kaladin was attracted to fighting even before the bond. Syl just increased a natural tendency of his.

[asterion137]

but if the bond was as druglike as that, I don't think the 1500 knights would suddenly go cold turkey

[Capt. Goradel]

But remember when Kaladin didn't have his abilities, from breaking his oaths? He said that his own natural talent with the spear and love for the thrill of fighting was a effect of the bond and Syl the whole time, he just hadn't realized it.  @Figberts

[ScarletSabre]

Don't forget we have WOB that Surgebinding, like many powers in he Cosmere, can be addictive, and we do see hints of that with Kaladin. The desperation and fear when he suddenly can't breathe in Stormlight without Syl being near and reminded of his oaths to bring her back to sentience is very reminiscent of suddenly going cold turkey from something addictive.... 

Perhaps the bond isn't inherently insidious, but depends on the individual Spren, and on the dependence he Radiant feels towards them and their powers. The Recreance Radiants may have given up their oaths in part to escape the seduction of their surges once and for all. 

[1stBondsmith]

It would seem to me that all of them wanting to quit is still rather unexplainable. There must have been a stronger motive than, "Hey, we are all addicted to this power and control thing. Lets all quit!" I strongly believe that there is a more honorable (pun very intended) reason for the Recreance, and that when we learn it we will also argue about whether they should have quit, as they did, or been wiser and trusted the spren. That also could go either way, but we won't know till we find out why they decided to do it together, and at that time.

[Subvisual Haze]

Sorry to resurrect my own thread but I ran across a Word of Brandon that I think might be adding weight to my "Loss of Free Will" Theory.

Quote

BRANDON SANDERSON

Any investiture, over time, will slowly change one’s personality, no matter how small that investiture.

Hmm, so in addition to the Radiant's having their ability to meaningfully make decisions strongly restricted by their adherence to the oaths they swore, we can also assume that all the sweet Honor Investiture (Stormlight) that they burn through is subtlety causing changes in their very nature.  Add to that the fact that using investiture seems to be mildly habit forming (Spook I'm looking at you), and thing are...a little creepy to be honest.

[emailanimal]

On 10/13/2016 at 7:40 AM, The One Who Connects said:

The way I understood the idea is that you are basically bribed into acting a certain way.

I think that the existing examples in the books somewhat contradict the idea of bonding being a form of a contract the way you are describing. 

It seems that this more about the specific people choosing to live their life in a specific way that causes the bond. That is - their decision is not based on the future rewards in the form of a shining fork made out of a god metal, or their ability to fly/travel/hide/heal/punch/lead/jump/glide/grow/see/whatever.   So, what we are seeing is the case of a conscious choice to do what is "right" (from a specific perspective) and being rewarded postfactum by the appropriate spren.

[emailanimal]

On 10/10/2016 at 8:33 PM, Subvisual Haze said:

 Maybe the Radiants of the past got tired of spren inviting tragic events onto their chosen knights and decided to abandon their oaths as a result?

So you are using the fact that everyone dies and Kaladin survives as support for Kaladin being cursed and Knights Radiant being plagued by horrible things happening to them? I mean, as of the end of WoR the main curse incurred by the new Knights Radiant is that Nalan is hell-bent on offing them, and in that sense they are effectively cursed. 

To be completely honest, the fact that different "powers" seem to be attracted to people who can become powerful Surgebinders is not really all that strange. We have evidence that certain people attracted multiple types of spren. So, it is not that much of a stretch to assume that they might attract Odium. Looking at it in another way, if you are an all-powerful evil, and there are some strong proponents of the all-powerful good that emerge, wouldn't you want to off them ASAP?   So, yeah, of course all KRs have a target painted on them - and in more ways than one (at least until Nale subsides).

 

[Subvisual Haze]

29 minutes ago, emailanimal said:

I think that the existing examples in the books somewhat contradict the idea of bonding being a form of a contract the way you are describing. 

It seems that this more about the specific people choosing to live their life in a specific way that causes the bond. That is - their decision is not based on the future rewards in the form of a shining fork made out of a god metal, or their ability to fly/travel/hide/heal/punch/lead/jump/glide/grow/see/whatever.   So, what we are seeing is the case of a conscious choice to do what is "right" (from a specific perspective) and being rewarded postfactum by the appropriate spren.

At first sure, you doing the right thing is what draws the spren to you.  The concern is more, what about once you're hooked on that sweet, sweet Stormlight?

Maybe I'm overly projecting onto Kaladin because I work in healthcare and also have personally have struggled with Seasonal Depression pretty much my entire adult life.  But if you asked me to choose between a "right" and a "wrong" action ("right" and "wrong" being labeled by an outside party), with me knowing full well that choosing the "wrong" action would result in:

1. The loss of a skill that I take personal pride in and makes me feel special (spear wielding for Kaladin)
2. A sudden decline in health both physical and mental due to losing access to my habit-forming god-essence gas
3. The death of an imaginary friend who has been a great source of psychological support (I'm stretching a bit here, but I think any of us can imagine being absolutely crushed if we "killed" someone like Syl)

It's barely even a choice.  Hell, I'd probably do whatever my spren told me was the "right" thing just to keep the happy, pain-soothing, depression dulling stormlight flowing.  It's not purposefully coercive on the part of the spren, but at that point, with the known results that I listed above do you even have much of a choice anymore?  This isn't even touching on the magical god-like powers angle, just the psychological aspects.  

(I'm actually a clinical pharmacist irl, and Stormlight honestly does sound like it would be an incredibly habit forming substance.  It heals you, it dulls pain, it makes you "feel alive" with a "storm inside", it seems to lessen or at least temporarily distract from psychological pain.  These sound like descriptions of the pharmacological effects of opioids or amphetamines to me.)

[emailanimal]

3 minutes ago, Subvisual Haze said:

It's barely even a choice.  Hell, I'd probably do whatever my spren told me was the "right" thing just to keep the happy, pain-soothing, depression dulling stormlight flowing.

 

As much as this might be the case, this is not what spren are doing in the few examples of Surbinders taking Oaths (or speaking Truths) that we actually get to see in the books. Kaladin is saying the Second Oath not because he has a Stormlight craving he cannot resist, but because he is placed in a situation where he recognizes what he must do and that happens to be the Second Oath of Windrunners. Syl did not dangle the prospect of Stormlight in front of him if he figures out the words. 

So, based on this I am not certain that "bribing" is how I would describe it. To put it in other words: if your motives for saying the Oaths are to get access to the all-powerful drug of Stromlight, you have the wrong Intent, and therefore, you are not going to bond a spren.

 

3 minutes ago, Subvisual Haze said:

(I'm actually a clinical pharmacist irl, and Stormlight honestly does sound like it would be an incredibly habit forming substance.  It heals you, it dulls pain, it makes you "feel alive" with a "storm inside", it seems to lessen or at least temporarily distract from psychological pain.  These sound like descriptions of the pharmacological effects of opioids or amphetamines to me.)

I do not disagree with you on this. The issue is not whether Stormlight is habit-forming (it is), but whether spren behave in the way you ascribe to them. I posit that nothing in the text supports the latter.

 

I think, a better way to look at it is in the framework of "a boon and a curse". Knights Radiant get a boon: Stromlight! and a curse: it's addictive! and will change them. 

[CosmereQuestioner]

I think your theory has a lot of merit. I agree that Syl (and the spren in general) aren't nefariously dangling storm light in front of the Knights saying "obey my code or lose your power"...but the reality is that's what is happening.  

Maybe it's a side effect of the bond, but watching Kaladin during WoR there is a definite sense of controlling taking place.  And while it was driven more by Kaladin's goodness than a pure "loss of power" motivation, it still existed in force.

I could easily see the recreance as a response to the ever increasing pressures of following a strict code that might not always line up with desired behaviour. (At the risk of loss of power for so long, until finally determined not to be worth it.)

[DrakeMarshall]

On 10/10/2016 at 8:33 PM, Subvisual Haze said:

There's a pretty ominous blurb on the back cover of Words of Radiance, that I think might point to a darker effect of the Nahel Bond.  I have two theories on what this could mean (which specific one is right I have no clue), but I think we would be naive in assuming the Nahel Bond is a purely positive experience for the recipient.

"Men seek what was lost; I fear the quest will destroy them.

It is the nature of the magic.  A broken soul has cracks into which something else can be fit. Surgebindings, the power of creation themselves; they can brace a broken soul, but they can also widen its fissures"

That sounds dark enough by itself, but it gets even more uncomfortable when comparing this to a familiar cosmere magical system (it sounds uncomfortably similar to how a hemalurgic spike cracks open a person's soul to invite outside influence or control).  The imagery of cracked souls matches what we've been told so far in Stormlight Archive.  Knights Radiant of the past according to Syl were all "broken" people.  Being a broken person with a damaged soul seems like a pre-req for spren to be able to form a bond with humans.  Indeed (from what we've observed so far), it is frequently only in moments of great psychological stress that the bond between spren and human can be strengthened. This seems like a full boon for our heroic knight, as they gain awesome powers for seemingly no cost.  But what if there is a cost?

1) Loss of Free Will Every oath the knight speaks, the tighter their bond with their spren grows.  Using the existing cracked soul analogy, one can picture the spren plugging the cracks in the human's soul to make them spiritually whole again (almost like a filling in a tooth cavity).  But a more insidious way of seeing this is that the knight's soul is becoming less and less their own, and more and more their spren's.  Each oath the knight swears, the more of their soul is bound up with their spren, the more spren-like they become.  What's more, this isn't restoring the knight's soul, but only covering up the cracks (with a cover that can be later taken away).    Sure swearing those oaths grants you more power, but it also forces you to live your life according to a very strict set of rules.  At what point does fear about breaking those rules deprive a human radiant of their free will?  At what point do they stop being a human struggling to embrace an ideal, and become just an ideal?

I think Kaladin's dark night of the soul at the end of WOR is a poignant example of this.  Because he swore conflicting oaths, his power left him, reverting him into his sad pre-Radiant state: chronically depressed, full of pain, and discovering that even skills he thought he had earned on his own (gracefulness with spear) were really only gifts granted by his spren bond.  It is only by surrendering to the oaths previously sworn that Kaladin could become a functional human being again.  Syl said she didn't want to force Kaladin to do the right thing, but functionally that is exactly what she did!  Remembering the shock of his non-Radiant state, Kaladin will likely have something approaching panic disorder if he approaches future oath violations.  Again, remember that all Radiants are damaged people.  What if they all lived in chronic anxiety of breaking their oaths and reverting to being a non-magical mess again?  And what about the addictive nature of stormlight consumption?  Would such a constant stress to obey oaths, without the immediate need of a Desolation, be enough to jumpstart the Reacreance?  Possibly!

2) I'm cursed - Kaladin makes some repeated ruminations that his continued survival while others fall is a sign that he is cursed.  Syl dismisses this as nonsense, and it is our first impulse as readers to just pass this off as Survivor's Guilt on Kaladin's part.  But what if he has a kernel of truth there?  In Mistborn Secret History we have an interesting scene where Kelsier's shadow is trying to chase Vin around.  Preservation loans some power to Kelsier, which temporarily strengthens him, but Ruin quickly responds by crushing Kelsier with mental force.  Once Preservation gives up and withdraws his power from Kelsier, Kel notices that Ruin also can no longer restrain him as effectively.  I think this was Brandon giving us a clue that competing shards often work in balance of one another, and one shard expanding their power on a human quickly draws the jealous attention of their enemy.  What if a similar situation is at play on Roshar?  A whole lot of incredibly unpleasant stuff is done to Kaladin and Shallan by the people around them in their life.  What if this wasn't just plot convenience?  What if Pattern and Syl starting to grant access to power to Kaladin and Shallan shines a spotlight on them for Odium and causes Odium to influence people nearby them to do a heaping of bad stuff in an attempt to break their spirit?  It seems awfully coincidental that both of their lives went to hell after their spren first started to observe/bond them.  Maybe the Radiants of the past got tired of spren inviting tragic events onto their chosen knights and decided to abandon their oaths as a result?  There might be a sort of magical reciprocity at play.

Okay. First of all, I want to say that this is a clever theory. Have an upvote.

But I don't think it is quite as bad as you think. I agree that the risks of the nahel bond are likely much, much bigger than we think right now. But I don't think that is intended in the nahel bond. I would guess that the nahel bond is inherently good, and the danger lies in Odium exploiting the cracks in people's souls. And quite probably exploiting the flow of Honor's investiture.

The things I mention above are serious dangers. But loss of free will? Kaladin was offered a choice. Yes, one choice would have consequences including the loss of his powers. But he, of his own volition, chose to ultimately re-affirm his oaths. I think it is safe to say that not all radiants have made that same choice. I would guess that individual radiants broke their oaths before the recreance.

[Jaconis]

As people have said, I'm not sure the loss of free will is a consequence, intentional or not, of the Nahel bond. The part of your theory I like more is the final bit, about being cursed. The fact that, for both Kaladin and Shallan, everything does get far worse for them after they begin bonding their spren is something I had noticed myself, but not put together or linked to anything.

We even have reason to believe that Odium was influencing Shallan's father besides this theory. When Hoid visits her, he says something along the lines of, "the things [she fights] aren't completely natural." 

For Kaladin, Sadeas' POV seem to indicate some other influence, some inexplicable change in personality to be more bloodthirsty, almost an addiction to the Thrill. Between he and Amaram, someone around Kaladin was being influenced by Odium, maybe for just not as long as Shallan's father, and so not as noticeable. 

[Subvisual Haze]

Oh definitely, I don't believe in my own theories 100% either, just trying to get some discussion going about something that troubled me in reading Kaladin's chapters.  I think Syl is a very nice and well intentioned spren who would never knowingly do Kaladin harm, but that doesn't mean their bond is all sunshine and rainbows either though.  I think the trickiest thing with the Radiants/Recreance is that chapter intro written in code that people much more intelligent than me figured out meant,

Quote

Hold the secret that broke the Knights Radiant.  You may need it to destroy the new orders when they return.

I initially bought into the theory that the Radiants gave up their shards as a well intentioned sacrifice in an attempt to delay/inhibit future desolations, a theory which Nale and certain other Heralds believed themselves.  But that doesn't jive with the epigraph above, which seems to imply a secret that can break the radiants even after the desolation and radiant orders have already returned.  The two (probably mutually exclusive) theories that I'm pitching seem like they might be going in the right direction though to try to explain that discrepancy though.  It feels like it needs to be something personally harmful to the Radiants themselves.

[The One Who Connects]

On 12/6/2016 at 0:07 AM, emailanimal said:

On 10/13/2016 at 9:40 AM, The One Who Connects said:

The way I understood the idea is that you are basically bribed into acting a certain way.

I think that the existing examples in the books somewhat contradict the idea of bonding being a form of a contract the way you are describing. [. . .]
As much as this might be the case, this is not what spren are doing in the few examples of Surgebinders taking Oaths (or speaking Truths) that we actually get to see in the books. So, based on this I am not certain that "bribing" is how I would describe it. To put it in other words: if your motives for saying the Oaths are to get access to the all-powerful drug of Stormlight, you have the wrong Intent, and therefore, you are not going to bond a spren.

Not to quote myself but I worded it better back then: "Insidious or not, the Nahel Bond does force you to adhere to a certain lifestyle."

I know the Spren/Stormlight Fix comment was meant for someone else' post, but I'm responding to how my "bribery" comment ties into it.
You are correct that the Spren don't use the Stormlight as a tool to bribe them into following the Oaths, but the Magic System itself does in a sense. The Spren are more or less a naive middleman in the transaction. (Having flashbacks to my Business Law class is an .. interesting experience)

Edit (Clicked Post accidentally): Gah, what can I say that isn't a rehash of what I or others have said..?
"Do this thing/say these words/live this lifestyle, you get to have powers. If you don't do what the bond wants, you get nothing."
It's a simple concept that we're trying to blow out of proportion becasue that's what we do on this site. Out of proportion, we see things differently and it helps us understand

Edited December 13, 2016 by The One Who Connects
Edit: Incomplete Post

[HavoKinetic]

Isn't this essentially what Honor is? You've made a decision to live a certain way, probably for some perceived benefit to you, but of course that way limits you from living other ways. You are Honorbound - bound having adhesive but also restrictive meaning.  You retain the free will to break your nahel bond, oathpact, if you decide the juice isn't worth the squeeze. Doesn't seem like the spren, or even Honor, are insidious in that case. They're just doing what they do, following their intent.

Edited December 13, 2016 by HavoKinetic
Grammar