Syl and Pattern's past?

[King Cole he/him]

When I read through Words of Radiance for the 6th time, I started taking notes on things I found interesting. One of them was Pattern's cryptic reference (do you see what I did there?) to Shallan about an unnamed "her". I became curious about this and then when I read Way of Kings again I noticed Syl telling Kaladin that she has helped people kill before. It was then that I thought that perhaps Syl and Pattern have been previously bonded to people. 

I have no idea if information about this has been previously uncovered but this was just my initial ideas at this information.

[Calderis he/him]

I'll keep an eye on Pattern when I get to WoR for this particular reread. I'm sure that Syl has bonded before, but from what I remember of Pattern, it seemed like he saw Shallan killing him as an inevitability because all Cryptics that had bonded were killed. 

I'm not certain, but like I said, I'll try to pay attention. 

[Brightlord M. Alhstrom he/him]

One problem with this theory: If I get the mechanics right, when the KR betrayed their oaths, their spren died, but their corpses remained as the Shardblades. So how could you have any spren who have held a bond and not died? The only other case I can think of is if their bond wasn't a KR bond, but one to a Listener, but I'm fairly sure that the KR and Listeners use different types of spren.

 

[Calderis he/him]

4 minutes ago, Lord Maelstrom said:

One problem with this theory: If I get the mechanics right, when the KR betrayed their oaths, their spren died, but their corpses remained as the Shardblades. So how could you have any spren who have held a bond and not died? The only other case I can think of is if their bond wasn't a KR bond, but one to a Listener, but I'm fairly sure that the KR and Listeners use different types of spren.

 

Only spren bonded during the Recreance would be trapped as blades. In Syl's case, just because she had been party to a bond in the past, does not mean she was at the time of the betrayal. 

Edited July 13, 2017 by Calderis

[King Cole he/him]

4 minutes ago, Calderis said:

Only spren bonded during the Recreance would be trapped as blades. In Syl's case, just because she had been party to a bond in the past, does not mean she was at the time of the betrayal. 

Do we have any idea what happens to sprens whose KR dies? 

26 minutes ago, Calderis said:

I'll keep an eye on Pattern when I get to WoR for this particular reread. I'm sure that Syl has bonded before, but from what I remember of Pattern, it seemed like he saw Shallan killing him as an inevitability because all Cryptics that had bonded were killed. 

I'm not certain, but like I said, I'll try to pay attention. 

What im talking about here is on page 293 of paper back WoR. Pattern says this in reference to Shallan's curiousity

[Calderis he/him]

1 minute ago, King Cole said:

Do we have any idea what happens to sprens whose KR dies? 

We know it is emotionally traumatic, like loosing a close family member or lover, but the Spren survives and can bond again.

[King Cole he/him]

2 minutes ago, Calderis said:

We know it is emotionally traumatic, like loosing a close family member or lover, but the Spren survives and can bond again.

SO if this is correct its probably that

[Scriptorian he/him]

4 minutes ago, Calderis said:

We know it is emotionally traumatic, like loosing a close family member or lover, but the Spren survives and can bond again.

 

4 minutes ago, cloudjumper said:

They don't die if that's what you're asking. They just are free of their bond.

Just watched you two post at the exact same moment, answering the same question. 

Edit: to actually contribute to the topic, there's a pretty strong implication that the Stormfather has bonded previously as well, given the limited number of Bondsmith spren. 

Edited July 13, 2017 by Scriptorian

[Brightlord M. Alhstrom he/him]

20 minutes ago, Scriptorian said:

Edit: to actually contribute to the topic, there's a pretty strong implication that the Stormfather has bonded previously as well, given the limited number of Bondsmith spren. 

Do you mind giving supporting evidence or linking to a thread on the subject? I don't remember anything in the books about there being a lack of Bondsmith spren.

[Calderis he/him]

5 minutes ago, Lord Maelstrom said:

Do you mind giving supporting evidence or linking to a thread on the subject? I don't remember anything in the books about there being a lack of Bondsmith spren.

I just did a super quick search, and can't find what I'm looking for, but part of the Stormfather's broken mind and reticence about bonding Dalinar, and Syl bonding Kaladin is due to having been damaged during the recreance. His nature and size allowed him to survive, but he was damaged. 

In addition, we know that there are only 3 Bondsmith spren total, so if there was a full contingent of Bondsmiths at the time, then he was most definitely bound. 

[Scriptorian he/him]

Quote

Q: When it comes to the… epic-level spren on Roshar, like the Nightwatcher and Stormfather - is the number of epic-level spren equal to the number of Bondsmiths that you have on Roshar?

A: Hm, is the number of epic-level spren related to the number of Bondsmiths you have? Well, I’ve said there’s a maximum of three. And there are three Shards involved in Roshar. I’m not gonna tell you if that’s a coincidence or not. Sorry. [laughter]

I can never seem to actually find where he originally confirmed a maximum of three Bondsmiths (the in-world WoR epigraph only seems to say that three was a common number, not the necessarily the maximum). I suppose this means there could be more spren that could potentially make bondsmiths, just that there was never more than three bonded at a time. But just how many more spren like the Stormfather could there have been? There usual train of thought has the Stormfather, the Nightwatcher, and some other mega spren (possibly of Odium) as the three candidates for Bondsmiths spren. 

Edit: third time ninja'd today. I seem to attract them. 

Edit again: reread the WoB and realized it could mean a maximum of three Bondsmiths or a maximum of three spren (the latter implying the former). Either way, it's probable the Stormfather was bonded previously as Calderis described. 

Edited July 13, 2017 by Scriptorian

[Calderis he/him]

@Scriptorian you can't find it because it didn't originate in book or WoB. It originated in the Stormlight Archive pocket companion, that Tor released a couple years ago for independent bookstore day. 

He later confirmed that they got the information from him and it can be considered Canon. 

Edited July 13, 2017 by Calderis

[Scriptorian he/him]

3 minutes ago, Calderis said:

@Scriptorian you can't find it because it didn't originate in book or WoB. It originated in the Stormlight Archive pocket companion, that Tor released a couple years ago for independent bookstore day. 

He later confirmed that they got the information from him and it can be considered Canon. 

Ah...thanks!

To throw another thought out there, I've had this headcannon that Renarin's spren (Glys) had previously been bonding with Ym before Nale killed the poor shoemaker. Of course, this thought mostly originated from the (now defunct) idea that there was only going to be one spren from each order. 

[Brightlord M. Alhstrom he/him]

Now I'm really interested in all of this. And if you guys don't mind, I have questions:

 - What says that Bondsmith can't be made from normal Honorspren (that's the right term right?). Where did you guys get the idea that Bondsmith mean mega spren?

 - Why would you think that there could only be one from each order? The Visions show an army of KR dropping their swords and leaving. To me this seems to imply that each order was large (anywhere from 10-40). What am I missing? Did I read that vision wrong?

 - If the other orders number in the dozens, but you only have 3 bondsmith, does that mean that Bondsmith are OP compared to other KR?

[Calderis he/him]

10 minutes ago, Lord Maelstrom said:

Now I'm really interested in all of this. And if you guys don't mind, I have questions:

 - What says that Bondsmith can't be made from normal Honorspren (that's the right term right?). Where did you guys get the idea that Bondsmith mean mega spren?

 - Why would you think that there could only be one from each order? The Visions show an army of KR dropping their swords and leaving. To me this seems to imply that each order was large (anywhere from 10-40). What am I missing? Did I read that vision wrong?

 - If the other orders number in the dozens, but you only have 3 bondsmith, does that mean that Bondsmith are OP compared to other KR?

This is one of the main, non-story reasons I'm excited for Oathbringer. 

We know that Bondsmiths were limited to 3. We know that they never had Shardblades. We know that each of the three were bonded to 3 specific spren, of which we only know the Stormfather for certain (but the Nightwatcher is most likely another). 

The bits we do know, make the vast amount we don't painful. This is the bondsmith focus book, so we are bound to get some of this stuff answered. 

Edited July 13, 2017 by Calderis

[Brightlord M. Alhstrom he/him]

Just now, Calderis said:

This is one of the main, non-stop reasons I'm excited for Oathbringer. 

We know that Bondsmiths were limited to 3. We know that they never had Shardblades. We know that each of the three were bonded to 3 specific spren, of which we only know the Stormfather for certain (but the Nightwatcher is most likely another). 

The bits we do know, make the vast amount we don't painful. This is the bondsmith focus book, so we are bound to get some of this stuff answered. 

Yes. But where did you guys learn this?????????? I mean, would you please give me a source?  

[Calderis he/him]

6 minutes ago, Lord Maelstrom said:

Yes. But where did you guys learn this?????????? I mean, would you please give me a source?  

I will try to dig for WoBs and edit them back into this post. I'm not confident I can find them all but I'll try. 

Edit: @Lord Maelstrom here's what I got. 

http://www.theoryland.com/intvmain.php?i=1052#64

Quote

QUESTION

Before the Recreance, there were three Bondsmiths. Did they all bond supersprens, or is Dalinar an exception?

BRANDON SANDERSON

They did something similar.

QUESTION

Can the Unmade be bonded?

BRANDON SANDERSON

Wow...plausible. Er, possible, I should say.

QUESTION

If you came up with a Radiant-like ideal, for yourself as a writer, what would it be?

BRANDON SANDERSON

What a great question! (writes the answer in asker's book).

FOOTNOTE

Does this imply that the unmade are spren?

From Pagerunner's Reddit WoB collection, #495

Quote

Q: The pocket companion states that there are three spren that can bond a person to make them into a bondsmith, the Stormfather being one of them. As far as I recall the books implied that the number was low, and implied heavily that it was around that number in an epigraph, but didn't actually have a straight confirmation. So, should I take that as canon?
 
A: Yes, you can take that as canon. They came to me for that information.
 
Q: Sweet. I guess it hasn't been canonized which three spren these are? I seem to recall that the prevailing theory on 17th Shard was that Nightwatcher was one of them, and the third was that weird spren with too many faces that Axies the Collector looked at in the tWoK interlude.
 
A: RAFO.
 

And... That's all I got. 

Edited July 13, 2017 by Calderis

[+ElephantEarwax he/him]

7 minutes ago, Calderis said:

This is one of the main, non-story reasons I'm excited for Oathbringer. 

We know that Bondsmiths were limited to 3. We know that they never had Shardblades. We know that each of the three were bonded to 3 specific spren, of which we only know the Stormfather for certain (but the Nightwatcher is most likely another). 

The bits we do know, make the vast amount we don't painful. This is the bondsmith focus book, so we are bound to get some of this stuff answered. 

Has the Stormfather bonding all of the bondsmiths been torn down?  

This post explains it better then my thoughts.

 

[Calderis he/him]

4 minutes ago, ElephantEarwax said:

Has the Stormfather bonding all of the bondsmiths been torn down?  

This post explains it better then my thoughts.

 

Unfortunately yes. Three distinct spren all granting the same set of surges and performing a similar function, when every other order is comprised of people bonding to what are essentially identical beings bothers me still... But it is what it is. 

[Scriptorian he/him]

We still know basically nothing about Dustbringer, Willshaper, Stoneward, or Skybreaker spren. And we really don't know much about Truthwatcher's or Elsecaller's either. So any one of those could break what we currently see as the pattern (pun intended) for nahel bonds. The in-world WoR snipets only draw attention to the Bondsmiths being weird in this way, though. So...*shrugs* I gonna go back inside my cadmium bubble till November. 

Edited July 13, 2017 by Scriptorian
Snipets, not snipers.

[+ElephantEarwax he/him]

31 minutes ago, Calderis said:

Unfortunately yes. Three distinct spren all granting the same set of surges and performing a similar function, when every other order is comprised of people bonding to what are essentially identical beings bothers me still... But it is what it is. 

I just read through WoK, WoR, and AU in the last week and a half and from what I can gather I do not think we have seen the other spren that bond with to make bondsmiths. Does that seem accurate?

But I had a thought, could they be other splinters from Honor? I think that would fit with what we have seen in other nahel bonds, and if they were less powerful than the Stormfather, they could have been broken, or injured more. That being why they have not been seen.

 

Edited July 13, 2017 by ElephantEarwax
Added stuff

[The One Who Connects he/him]

5 hours ago, Calderis said:

His nature and size allowed him to survive, but he was damaged.

This is still debated, as far as I'm aware. I was under the impression that the only reason the Stormfather "survived" the Recreance is because Tanavast's Cognitive Shadow bonded with him.

For the topic itself, the relevant passage showing that he did suffer the Recreance.

Quote

. . . Shallan pulled the blanket around her closer. "An entire people, all killed?"

"Not just one people," Pattern said, solemn, "Many, Spren with minds were less plentiful then, and the majorities of several spren peoples were all bonded. There were very few survivors. The one you call Stormfather lived. Some others. The rest, thousands of us, were killed when the event happened. You call it the Recreance." 

WoR Chapter 75 True Glory

---

4 hours ago, Scriptorian said:

We still know basically nothing about Dustbringer, Willshaper, Stoneward, or Skybreaker Spren. And we really don't know much about Truthwatcher's or Elsecaller's either.

Skybreakers bond Highspren. Elsecallers bond Inkspren(at least, Ivory is one). The others are an unknown though.

[Calderis he/him]

11 minutes ago, The One Who Connects said:

This is still debated, as far as I'm aware. I was under the impression that the only reason the Stormfather "survived" the Recreance is because Tanavast's Cognitive Shadow bonded with him.

The main reason I think this he survived on his own is that Honor survived the Recreance. 

By this WoB 

http://www.theoryland.com/intvmain.php?i=1177#12

Quote

QUESTION

Question about the stormlight itself : a highstorm, full of stormlight, fills the spheres. Then, the KR use the stormlight or the stormlight evaporates with time. Question : where does the stormlight in highstorms come from ? Is there like a "rain cycle", but for the stormlight ?

BRANDON SANDERSON

the stormlight in the highstorm is transferred from the Spiritual realm through the Stormfather into the highstorm.

If the Recreance were capable of killing the Stormfather, then the entire system should have broken between then, and when Tanavast's Shadow merged with the Stormfather 

[Brightlord M. Alhstrom he/him]

I suspect that part of what killed the Spren was when the KRs all dropped their Shardblades and severed the connections. So since the Stormfather wasn't in shardblade-form, it didn't have as much of an effect on him. That goes well with the fact that Shardblades are corpses of bonded spren (at least, I think thats been confirmed in the book) and the fact that the Stormfather refuses to be summoned as a Shardblade.

Edit: Essentially I'm saying that the reason the Stormfather refuses to be summoned as a shardblade is because he knows that a spren is vulnerable when in that form. Thus when the other spren were summoned as blades then had their bonds severed, they died and stayed as spren. The Stormfather also had his bond(s) severed, which hurt him, but since he wasn't a shardblade, he survived.

Edited July 13, 2017 by Lord Maelstrom

[The One Who Connects he/him]

11 minutes ago, Calderis said:

If the Recreance were capable of killing the Stormfather, then the entire system should have broken between then, and when Tanavast's Shadow merged with the Stormfather 

Until we get more concise details about the specific events and timing, I can still see ways around this.

• The Stormfather's immensity might have allowed him to hang on longer than just immediate death, and Tanavast's timing was cutting it close.
• The system may have been broken without him, but if the timegap between his death and Honor's death was short enough to fit between two storms(say.. during the Weeping), then he may have been able to correct it.
• The Stormlight being filtered through the Stormfather may be a recent thing that happens because of Honor's Shadow.
• The system may have ways around this to keep running. (I know the "life finds a way" argument isn't very good, but I'll include it for completeness)

---

Oh. Yea never mind, Maelstrom is probably right.

Edited July 13, 2017 by The One Who Connects