Secret History Drifter Question (SH Spoilers)

[Jellomancer]

Quick question. I know the Drifter who shows up at the Well of Ascension is Hoid. My husband and I have a disagreement: what exactly did he apply to his corpseboat Spanky (and why did that particular dead body not get sucked into the spiritual realm) and his oar? My husband thinks it was stormlight or some use of his Yolish light weaving, but I think he was applying something else-- liquid metal? Sand from Taldain? No clue. Do we have any WoB or strong theories on this?

[Weltall]

We don't really know. I think this WoB is the most that Brandon has said about that particular scene, or at least it's the only one I was able to find.

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Questioner

Why did Hoid in Secret History have to ride on another person to get to the Well, when that person could float on--

Brandon Sanderson

Sooo, what he's floating on is a Cognitive Shadow. It's a spirit, it's not an actual person. He is floating on someone who is--

Questioner

Do we know them?

Brandon Sanderson

You did not know them, don't worry about them. But see, he's using that as a boat because it's easy to sink through the mist. And if you notice, he has to coat his oar with Investiture in order to move him. So yeah, he's floating on a person's soul... It was so much easier with the Pits, but that's because there were boats and things.

source

So his 'corpseboat' didn't get pulled Beyond because it was a Cognitive Shadow and able to resist that pull. As for what Hoid coated his oar with, we have no idea. We know he has Taldaini sand (maybe not at that moment in time, but we know he has some centuries later) but it would have to be mixed with some binding agent to actually stick to the oar and that might mess with the Investiture, since pouring water on the sand is enough to release it. Limits the range of methods he could use. Similarly, stormlight is hard to take off Roshar so it probably wasn't that.

The same novel shows an Invested liquid of some sort used by the Ire; they drink one form of it and another is used to create enough Connection to Preservation to allow someone to take up that Shard when they might not be able to do so normally. Hoid may not be using the exact same substance but it could be something similar.

Edited February 26, 2018 by Weltall