KR spren are not just of Honor and Cultivation

[DeTess she/her]

After reading through some recent threads about dishardic intents and Spren, the basics of a small theory have started to come up. Before going into details, I'd first like to present this WoB.

Quote

QUESTION

Is Cultivation's Shardholder still alive.

BRANDON SANDERSON

Good question, what do you think?

QUESTION

I want to say, but that's based on my knowledge before I read Lift's interlude from Words of Radiance. Now I am leaning towards no. Based on that interlude, it looks like spren have essence from both Honor and Cultivation. It's almost like they exist in a spectrum, on one end of which is Honor, and on the other - Cultivation; so there are spren that are, for the lack of better example, 90% Honor and 10% Cultivation, and there are spren that are 15% Honor and 85% Cultivation.

BRANDON SANDERSON

That's a very astute observation

source (number 8)

Though Brandon doesn't outright confirm that the interpretation, which had been presented by @Argent, is correct, his reply does suggest that his theory is at least in the right direction.

Now, this brings us to my theory, which is that the spren of the knights radiant aren't just made from Honor's and Cultivation's investiture, but also of Odium's. Odium's influence would be a lot smaller than either Honor's or Cultivation's, but of the spren we know about, there is one that I suspect contain a considerable amount of Odium's investiture, being the high spren (Skybreakers), though other types of KR spren would also contain some measure of Odium's investiture. The dustbringers come to mind as an example, though if this theory is true, almost all KR spren(Honor and Cultivation Spren being the exception) contain some measure of Odium..

The reason I suspect the High-spren stems from the discussion around dishardic intents, and the suggestion that the Honor+Odium shard would be Justice. This can be seen in the current skybreakers, who seem to Honor their laws and bonds, but also seem to have a hate for those that do wrong. Likewise, when Kalladin talks to Syl about taking justice against Amaram into his own hands, Syl compares his behavior to that of a Skyrbeaker, and it is safe to say that Kalladin hates Amaram.

Anyway, this is my theory. Let its deconstruction begin!

[Spoolofwhool]

Interesting thought. There is a WoB though that says that all the spren we're running into, which seems to be referring to the Nahel Bond spren of the KRs, are all of Honor, Cultivation, or some mixture. My interpretation is that that doesn't leave any room for Odium's investiture, but I'm interested in seeing what other people think. Note that this came out before the WoB you presented, which is possibly where Argent got the seed of his question. Anyhow. Personally, I don't think there's a piece of Odium in the spren, regardless of the WoB below. Also, I disagree with your assessment that the justice of the Skybreakers stems from hatred. It seems a lot more like a zero tolerance policy, combined with, in Nale's case, with a heavy sense of logic.

Edgedancer spoilers

Spoiler

We had a close look at Nale and some Skybreakers who were progressing their oaths. None of them seemed guided by hatred. Rather, it's the opposite, they seem driven simply to make the world a better place. 

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QUESTION

A question related to that. There’s an idea going around that all the spren that can Nahel Bond, all Knight Radiant spren are called honorspren, and then Nohadon talks specifically about honorspren. Is that the case? You know, is it just the Windrunner spren, or is it all the spren?

BRANDON SANDERSON

I’m going to deal with this in the next book. So I’ll just go ahead and let it be a literal RAFO. It is coming.

(interruption, leading Brandon to lose his train of thought)

So what we are dealing with here is that all Spren are indeed all pieces of the one who has gone, so those spren are all- except the Windrunner spren, the spren like Syl, have certain umm.

ZAS

Nohadon mentioned that "All the spren aren’t as discerning as honorspren."

BRANDON SANDERSON

So there has been dissension among them about who gets to call themselves honorspren, if that makes sense, and there is some disagreement among scholars about which ones are really, you know "This is what defines an honorspren".

But the spren you are running into are all (something) of either Honor or Cultivation, or some mixture between them. And you can usually tell the ones that are more Honor, and the ones that are more Cultivation. That should be able to be (something).

[Source]

 

[Savanorn he/him]

Hrm. 

I'm with spool, I don't think Nahel spren have any odium in them. 

Odiumspren do exist, but I don't think they're one or part of them. Part of this is because, unless I am mistaken, Surgebinding is the art that is Honour/Cultivation. I don't think there's 'room' for Odium in there. 

I presume that for the Storm Arts Voidbinding would be Odium/Honour and a third (old magic? Maybe?) Is Cultivation/Odium.

[Spoolofwhool]

5 hours ago, Savanorn said:

I presume that for the Storm Arts Voidbinding would be Odium/Honour and a third (old magic? Maybe?) Is Cultivation/Odium.

I believe Brandon has said that Fabrials are the result of a manifestation of investiture while the old magic is... something else. Probably more the direct usage of a shard's power on an entity versus a manifestation of investiture in my opinion.

[Exalted]

I agree with the sentiment that the Nahel spren don't have Odium in them, but I do think the Voidspren have a good chance of being exclusively of Odium, considering what they do when the Parshendi bond them.