(OB)Roshone

[RShara]

Roshone's lineage is known.  He's related to people in the kingdom, so I don't think he can be a Herald.

Quote

“It was complicated, soldier. Roshone was one of Highprince Sadeas’s sworn liegemen, cousin to important men whose support we needed.

--Words of Radiance, Chapter 62. The One Who Killed Promises.

Hearing that a Desolation, something out of myth and legends, is real and happening right then, I think, fully justifies his reaction.

37 minutes ago, Llarimar said:

is Venli's spren a Willshaper spren or is it just Eshonai's spren, or what's the difference...?

I'm not sure what you're asking here.  Timbre was originally trying to bond to Eshonai, but since Eshonai was dead, fled to Venli.  Timbre is almost certainly a Willshaper spren, and is possibly the daughter of the ship captain in Shadesmar, Ico, who says his daughter ran away chasing dreams.

 

[Llarimar]

4 minutes ago, RShara said:

I'm not sure what you're asking here.  Timbre was originally trying to bond to Eshonai, but since Eshonai was dead, fled to Venli.  Timbre is almost certainly a Willshaper spren, and is possibly the daughter of the ship captain in Shadesmar, Ico, who says his daughter ran away chasing dreams.

I had the impression during OB that the spren Venli saw drifting away from Eshonai was possibly the spren of Eshonai herself, in the same way that the Fused are reborn and become red lightning spren when they are killed.  I thought this mainly because TImbre acted so different from other spren we have met, and seemed to have a connection to Eshonai, and because I thought that the process for a parshman bonding a higher spren might somehow be different than a human (I was reluctant to believe that Venli was just "finding her spren" like Kaladin and Shallan and all the other Radiants - I thought something deeper might be going on).  I wondered several times during OB if at some point, perhaps in the next book, Venli will allow the spren of Eshonai to become reincarnated inside her gemheart, to bring Eshonai back to life, in the same way that the Fused use normal parshmen to come back to life - Venli frequently regrets that Eshonai is dead while she is alive, saying things like "The wrong sister died, the wrong sister lived."  I can see her sacrificing herself to reincarnate her sister.  I have also seen people say on forums that Venli is probably a Willshaper, and so I wondered if perhaps bonding the spren of Eshonai herself would somehow make Venli into a Willshaper.  

It makes sense, however, that Timbre is just simply a Willshaper spren, and doesn't have a closer connection to Eshonai.  However, I don't think Timbre is Ico's daughter, since I think Ico was a lightspren, which are the spren of the Truthwatchers.  I thought it was possible that Ico's daughter was Glys, Renarin's spren, which would make it extra sad for him since she is now corrupted.  

The only reason why I am suspicious about Venli's spren, really, is because we know so little about the Willshapers and what it would mean for a parshman to become one.  I think that there may be something more to the Venli-Timbre-Eshonai situation than we realize, and that Brandon is possibly going to make the Willshapers, and Venli's bond with Timbre, fundamentally different from the other Orders and the other spren-Radiant bonds.

[RShara]

Sapient beings don't become spren on death.  If they are invested enough, they can sometimes become Cognitive Shadows.  There's no reason for Odium to have Invested Eshonai enough to become a CS, since she was fighting against him (subconsciously) the whole time.

And if she did somehow become a Cognitive Shadow, she wouldn't have been able to grant Venli access to surgebinding, as opposed to whatever the Fused use.

And Timbre specifically says her grandfather was killed in the Recreance. 

I don't think there's confirmation that lightspren are Truthwatcher spren?  The prevalent theory is that lightspren are Willshaper spren.  Glys is male.  Renarin refers to Glys as "he" and when Sja-Anat talks to Shallan, she tells her to speak to her "son".

And Brandon has said that Eshonai is dead.

 

Edited January 10, 2018 by RShara

[Llarimar]

11 minutes ago, RShara said:

Sapient beings don't become spren on death.  If they are invested enough, they can sometimes become Cognitive Shadows.  There's no reason for Odium to have Invested Eshonai enough to become a CS, since she was fighting against him (subconsciously) the whole time.

And if she did somehow become a Cognitive Shadow, she wouldn't have been able to grant Venli access to surgebinding, as opposed to whatever the Fused use.

And Timbre specifically says her grandfather was killed in the Recreance. 

I don't think there's confirmation that lightspren are Truthwatcher spren?  The prevalent theory is that lightspren are Willshaper spren.  Glys is male.  Renarin refers to Glys as "he" and when Sja-Anat talks to Shallan, she tells her to speak to her "son".

And Brandon has said that Eshonai is dead.

All right... that all makes sense .  I guess I need to pay a little more attention to my theories before I develop them.  I probably just assumed that lightspren were Truthwatcher spren because the Truthwatcher spren are described as "light shining through a glass."  

[Song]

Can someone do a post on all the known and suspected Herald appearances? I have no clue and would love to know where to find them.

[Wandering Investor]

The truthwatcher's spren are mistspren. Eshonei saw the comet spren following her in book one. After her death, Timbre went to Venli instead. And its highly suspected that the comet spren is a lightspren, the same ones that ran the boat in Shadesmar. 

@Song as for the Heralds https://coppermind.net/wiki/Herald

[Govir]

8 hours ago, Llarimar said:

All right... that all makes sense .  I guess I need to pay a little more attention to my theories before I develop them.  I probably just assumed that lightspren were Truthwatcher spren because the Truthwatcher spren are described as "light shining through a glass." 

To be fair, in WoR, I thought the comet spren (that we now know as Timbre) was Eshonai. We don't see Timbre until after Eshonai goes into Stormform, so my theory was that parshmen "souls" were spren, and the Stormform spren kicked out Eshonai. That was all with just the information we had in WoR.

But from Oathbringer, it's clear that Timbre is a normal spren and not Eshonai. Timbre definitely crossed to the physical realm in search of Eshonai, but before a bond could be made, Eshonai took Stormform and eventually died. We know from the Wit epilogue in OB that a spren who crosses to the physical realm doesn't seem to be able to cross back (i.e. Wit picks up the spren that was forming a bond with Elhokar).

So all in all, your theory wasn't bad. It just didn't happen to be right (most of mine aren't right either!).

[Llarimar]

55 minutes ago, Govir said:

To be fair, in WoR, I thought the comet spren (that we now know as Timbre) was Eshonai. We don't see Timbre until after Eshonai goes into Stormform, so my theory was that parshmen "souls" were spren, and the Stormform spren kicked out Eshonai. That was all with just the information we had in WoR.

But from Oathbringer, it's clear that Timbre is a normal spren and not Eshonai.

This reminds me of something else from WoR that reinforces the discussion - when Eshonai first takes Stormform, she can hear a screaming in the back of her head.  At the time I thought this was just the metaphorical screaming of her sane self rebelling against the dark form of power, but it may have been Timbre, in the same way that dead spren scream when they are summoned as Shardblades.

As a side note, this seems like the most unexpected tangent imaginable for this thread to have taken (from Roshone to the nature of Venli's spren...?).  

[Isilel]

On 8.1.2018 at 4:44 AM, LH1407 said:

Wasn't Kalak at Gavilar's assassination with Nale?

Indeed he was and according to Jasnah he was posing as one of "ambassadors from the West" along with Nale, even though from Szeth's PoV (and maybe also Jasnah's own and even Eshonai's, I am not sure) he was described as looking like an Alethi. And there is really zero chance that he could have been Roshone, because Jasnah thought to herself that she had checked their credentials to make sure that they were safe to have as guests. Not carefully enough, obviously, but there is no way that she could have not noticed him being Roshone. Not to mention that the 2 Heralds _also_ conspicously and publicly chatted up Elhokar at the high table, and we know that Roshone had been exiled some time previously, while Gavilar was traveling and Dalinar was on a drinking binge, which left governance of the capital in Elhokar's hands.

Also, I have a feeling that Kalak is probably youthful-looking - he appears to be the youngest among the male Heralds in the depictions. Not to mention that I really don't see a whitespine getting the better of a Herald, even one without a Honorblade. 

It wouldn't surprise me if we next see Kalak posing as a low-to-mid-level Alethi or Veden Brightlord, but that's all the connection I can see between him and Roshone.

BTW, I was rather disappointed that we didn't have a scene of Jasnah showing her brother Hoid's pictures of the Heralds and him being dumbfounded to learn just who was socializing with him during the fateful feast when Gavilar was assassinated... .

[Song]

6 hours ago, Wandering Investor said:

 

@Song as for the Heralds https://coppermind.net/wiki/Herald

Thank you, I actually meant when they appear in the books (like drunk Jez with Dalinar). People talk about it all the time  on this forum but I never have any clue when I am reading the books.

[RShara]

9 minutes ago, Song said:

Thank you, I actually meant when they appear in the books (like drunk Jez with Dalinar). People talk about it all the time  on this forum but I never have any clue when I am reading the books.

If you click on the Herald's name, it should take to to a page that talks about what we know of each Herald, and when/where we've seen them, if we know (or have a reasonable suspicion).

[Wandering Investor]

^ What she said. 

Off the top of my head there's drunk Jez, Nale and Kalak(maybe) during WoR prolouge, Ishar is the Godking of Tukar and one of the ardents Shallan saw in WoK in the big library place is suspected to be one of the Heralds as well. And of course there's Shalash and Taln. 

But you'll get more info just reading through their specific pages.

[Weltall]

Yeah, thanks to OB we have five of the Heralds confirmed (Jezrien, Nale, Ash, Taln and Ishar) and while we might take anything he says with a grain or two of salt, Taravangian believes or at least claims to believe that he's identified Battar which gives us information on six. Brandon was asked if an old ardent who Shallan sees in the Palanaeum is Pali (which he confirmed was named after her) and while he didn't confirm it he did say it was a 'good guess' so we may have a rough idea where she is. Kelek we know was present on the night of Gavilar's death but we don't know what he's been up to since then. Chana is a complete unknown. Vedel's also unknown but I have a feeling that we're missing a clue somewhere in Oathbringer. My reasoning for this: The other three Heralds who got artwork in Oathbringer appeared either directly (Jezrien and Ash) or indirectly but quite prominently (Ishar, as 'Tezim' with his letter and then the connection was spelled out for us) which leaves her the odd one out. I'm not sure what that clue could be yet, it's just an impression.

Anyhow, between Roshone having a known background, neither his actions nor his attitude fitting what we see of Kelek and his particular flavor of insanity and there being a perfectly good explanation for his reaction, I don't think there's any waythat the two are one and the same.

[YKDG22]

Okay, so I'm going through the whole archive so far and here are some things I've noticed:

From WoK:

A middle-aged man with a short, grey-streaked beard stepped out. He wore a ruffled violet coat, tailored so that it was short at the front—reaching only to his waist—but long at the back.

Sanderson, Brandon. The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, Book 1) (p. 366). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

From this statement I find it interesting that they mention the violet coat, which isn't that the color associated with the Willshapers.

A takama. Few wore them anymore, but old soldiers in town spoke of the days when they’d been popular as warrior’s garb. Kal hadn’t expected the takama to look so much like a woman’s skirt, but still, it was a good sign. Roshone himself seemed a little too old, a little too flabby, to be a true soldier. But he wore a sword.

Sanderson, Brandon. The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, Book 1) (p. 366). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

So he's dressed odd in an antiquated fashion and he's not a soldier, but carries a sword.

Well, he thought. I guess we could expect a warrior to be curt, right? The heroes from the legends weren’t necessarily the polite types.

Sanderson, Brandon. The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, Book 1) (p. 367). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

Is this a hint to his true identity?

Roshone fell still, skewer held limply in his hand, brilliant green eyes narrowed, lips pursed tight. In the dark, those eyes almost seemed to glow.

Sanderson, Brandon. The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, Book 1) (p. 546). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

Here, it says he has green eyes, isn't eye color related to order? Do Heralds eyes match their order or is it just the Radiants? Interesting that Kaladin notes that they seem to glow.

 

[RShara]

2 hours ago, YKDG22 said:

Okay, so I'm going through the whole archive so far and here are some things I've noticed:

From WoK:

A middle-aged man with a short, grey-streaked beard stepped out. He wore a ruffled violet coat, tailored so that it was short at the front—reaching only to his waist—but long at the back.

Sanderson, Brandon. The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, Book 1) (p. 366). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

From this statement I find it interesting that they mention the violet coat, which isn't that the color associated with the Willshapers.

A takama. Few wore them anymore, but old soldiers in town spoke of the days when they’d been popular as warrior’s garb. Kal hadn’t expected the takama to look so much like a woman’s skirt, but still, it was a good sign. Roshone himself seemed a little too old, a little too flabby, to be a true soldier. But he wore a sword.

Sanderson, Brandon. The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, Book 1) (p. 366). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

So he's dressed odd in an antiquated fashion and he's not a soldier, but carries a sword.

Well, he thought. I guess we could expect a warrior to be curt, right? The heroes from the legends weren’t necessarily the polite types.

Sanderson, Brandon. The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, Book 1) (p. 367). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

Is this a hint to his true identity?

Roshone fell still, skewer held limply in his hand, brilliant green eyes narrowed, lips pursed tight. In the dark, those eyes almost seemed to glow.

Sanderson, Brandon. The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, Book 1) (p. 546). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

Here, it says he has green eyes, isn't eye color related to order? Do Heralds eyes match their order or is it just the Radiants? Interesting that Kaladin notes that they seem to glow.

 

Very interesting.  But again, Roshone has a known lineage, has cousins who are Alethi nobility, and had a son.  All signs that point to him not being a Herald.

Also, the Heralds' surgebinding abilities are tied to their Honorblades.  No Honorblade, no stormlight.  So unless he's a budding Radiant, his eyes wouldn't have been glowing.

Edited January 14, 2018 by RShara

[Calderis]

44 minutes ago, RShara said:

Very interesting.  But again, Roshone has a known lineage, has cousins who are Alethi nobility, and had a son.  All signs that point to him not being a Herald.

Also, the Heralds' surgebinding abilities are tied to their Honorblades.  No Honorblade, no stormlight.  So unless he's a budding Radiant, his eyes wouldn't have been glowing.

He also visibly aged since Kal was a kid.

[Yata]

It's more likely for an Herald to be' a darkeyes rather than a lighteyes as they have not their Surgebinding's abilities and they are not Radiants' descends

Of course they could be' lighteyes but It's mostly a random fact like in our world

[WhiteLeeopard]

Jezrien was darkeyed (brown I think), so no, eyes have nothing to do with Heralds. Its a pity Jez died, I was looking forward to the alethi losing their rust when they saw the king of Heralds walking in with dark eyes, and drunk off his head.

Roshone isn't Kalak, whitespine incident, aging, having a son and marrying Laral make it impossible.

Wasn't there a soft idea that Vedel was a nurse in T's death hopsital?

[YKDG22]

I don't understand the significance of his lineage. Aren't all of the Heralds somewhat blended into society? We know very little about how they behave between Desolations. For all we know they live normal human lives and die then are reborn. Plus this is an unusually long time for them maybe that's why they are taking so long to recover.

[YKDG22]

+ the Moash part of this makes sense, he tries to kill Kaladin(knight radiant), then kills Elhokar(king), then kills jezrien(herald). To now kill roshone if not Kalak that's a major letdown and not continuing his escalating motivation to work for Odium. I imagine they show him a picture of Kalak and his passions increase and he becomes a major big bad.

[Calderis]

2 hours ago, YKDG22 said:

I don't understand the significance of his lineage. Aren't all of the Heralds somewhat blended into society? We know very little about how they behave between Desolations. For all we know they live normal human lives and die then are reborn. Plus this is an unusually long time for them maybe that's why they are taking so long to recover.

They don't age. Death for a Herald means a return to Braize. If they aged and died, being "reborn" would mean returning and starting a desolation. 

They are functionally immortal. Kalak will look the same as he did when he walked away from the Oathpact, or as he did with Nale in Jasnah's Prologue (which now has to be him as we have all of the other male Heralds accounted for.) 

Roshone can't be Kalak. 

1 hour ago, YKDG22 said:

+ the Moash part of this makes sense, he tries to kill Kaladin(knight radiant), then kills Elhokar(king), then kills jezrien(herald). To now kill roshone if not Kalak that's a major letdown and not continuing his escalating motivation to work for Odium. I imagine they show him a picture of Kalak and his passions increase and he becomes a major big bad.

If Moash kills Roshone, it would only be because of his grandparents death. He blamed that on Elhokar. 

What implication is there in the text that Roshone is even on Odium/Moash's radar? 

[Yata]

13 hours ago, YKDG22 said:

We know very little about how they behave between Desolations. For all we know they live normal human lives and die then are reborn. Plus this is an unusually long time for them maybe that's why they are taking so long to recover.

You misunderstood this part. The Heralds don't rebirth freely. If one of them die, he/she will return to Damnation to seal the Fused. If one of them broke under Fused's torture they gain again a physical body and returns to Roshar because a Desolation is starting. They are always the same, they don't age and no of them died in the last 4500 years (Well Jezrien broke this record)

EDIT: Ninjed by storming @Calderis

Edited January 15, 2018 by Yata