What was it that Broke Shallan?

[WitSpren]

What was it that Broke Shallan?       Because she was clearly manufesting her powers and had already Said the Words - Before he mother tried to kill her!      He Mother wanted to kill her because Shallan was manufesting "powers" apparently "Playing with the Light".    Spren come to KR because they are "Broken" so, Shallan was already a surgebinder at 10 and that "scared" her mother & her friend/lover & they decided that they had to kill Shallan.     He Father fought the guy, & the Mother took a knife to try to kill Shallan, but Shallan was already far enough alone to produce a Shardknife" & killed her mother in self defense.

 

So even though this was given as Shallan's "Breaking", clearly her Breaking actually happened much earlier.

 

Is this an Error or will we get the rest of the story?

[Crysanja]

Shallans book is over, so i dont think there will be anything like flashbacks.

 

But a investigation into all the known KR is overdue. which could provide answers

[Colby Jack]

You'd be broken too if your own father stole your nose and never gave it back.

[kraefzke]

You'd be broken too if your own father stole your nose and never gave it back.

 

Do we have WoB on this? Or is it somewhere in the books? Confirmation of nose-theft, please!

:lol:

[Delightful]

I did notice a line, can't find it now, but something like "she'd been an anxious child even before the horrible sequence of events that lead to her father's death." Now, I would begin said sequence with her manifesting powers and then having her mum kill her, so clearly it was beforehand that she became a KR.

So...general anxiety? What caused her anxiety? Her brothers bullied her? (unlikely but im just throwing out ideas). 

 

On a similar note, I've been wondering about her progression as KR. At 6 or so years old she was surgebinding, and summoned Pattern as  a sword, which Kal could only do after saying the 3rd Ideal becoming a KR. But Pattern tells her in WoR that she's not a KR yet. So I;m very confused how she started surgebinding and why. Incidentally, I think this would put *Shallan* as one of the first the spren returned to, not Jasnah. The whole sequence of events is confusing and I almost wish we had another Shallan book to explain it all.

 

(apologies if this has been discussed before. Super-long threads scare me, and the Shallan ones are up to like 17 pages so....I haven't read them through.)

Edited March 17, 2014 by Delightful

[Argent]

On a similar note, I've been wondering about her progression as KR. At 6 or so years old she was surgebinding, and summoned Pattern as  a sword, which Kal could only do after saying the 3rd Ideal becoming a KR. But Pattern tells her in WoR that she's not a KR yet. So I;m very confused how she started surgebinding and why. Incidentally, I think this would put *Shallan* as one of the first the spren returned to, not Jasnah. The whole sequence of events is confusing and I almost wish we had another Shallan book to explain it all.

I've got a couple of bones to pick with this. First, Shallan kills her mother when she is 11, not 6 - the event itself took place about 6 years ago. Also, Gavilar's peace treaty with the Parshendi was another event took place about 6 years ago, and it was around that time that Jasnah first saw Ivory. So while Shallan had established her bond before Jasnah, the difference is not that drastic (I doubt Shallan would've been able to play with Surgebinding for too long before her mother reacted the way she did).

[aheerema]

My current understanding of the Nahel Bond and Surgebinding is pretty well summarized by the post, "Stages in the Nahel Bond", with the caveat that Surgebinding is a latent talent with minimal manifestation until full access is granted via the Nahel Bond, which requires a broken soul, as I noted here: http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/5423-stages-in-the-nahel-bond/page-2#entry113307

For Shallan, perhaps the actual cracking or breaking of her soul occurred as she watched he father try to defend her, as her own mother attempted to murder her.

[Aleksiel]

For Shallan, perhaps the actual cracking or breaking of her soul occurred as she watched he father try to defend her, as her own mother attempted to murder her.

 

There must have been a crack before, else she wouldn't have been able to connect to Pattern at all. Perhaps the Blade first appeared then, but her powers have been visible to her parents before.

 

Also, I am curious how could a child guess the first Ideal. It's not that easy or obvious.

 

Unfortunately, Shallan's book gave next to nothing new and provided a lot more questions. I think those are things we should have learned in Shallan's book.  There weren't any big questions left with Kal in WoK. However, with Shallan it seems we'll be getting much more on her early years in someone else's book, which is odd. 

[Lizzardborn]

A run of the mill child abuse could be explanation enough. It is not out of character for the father and with the mother deeply connected into some secret societies she could either not care or even encourage.

 

Her father was way too calm in the red carpet scene. So it was not the event that turned him to go crazy. 

[junior]

Are we guaranteed to only have one viewpoint book per character?  Is it guaranteed that we're not going to get another Shallan book?

 

In any event, since Shallan finally confronted her role in her mother's death, the primary obstruction keeping her from her past seems to have been dealt with.  So it's entirely possible that her early bonding with Pattern will get a quick chapter at some point that provides the details needed to make sense of her pre-matricide backstory.

[Velnica]

The Ghostbloods offered Veil the truth. What's the chance that we'll find the rest of Shallan's pas through them?

I agree though, something must've happened before the red carpet as it seemed like Pattern was already a sword before he went into the box.

[Macen]

You'd be broken too if your own father stole your nose and never gave it back.

This was, quite possible, the best thing I have seen all day. I wish I could upvote you multiple times Colby.

Fatal error: Allowed memory size of 67108864 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 502245680 bytes) in Unknown on line 0T

[Shadow Guardian]

While I don't have any solid theories on what would've broken Shallan prior to her killing her mother (I can only assume that, given her family history, it's very possible that some of the foundations that led to it were laid pretty early on), I would like to point out that even Kaladin's book didn't reveal 'everything' about his past, mainly the mysterious "Tarah" that gets name-dropped towards the end of TWoK. While I would agree that WoR didn't reveal nearly as much about Shallan as TWoK did about Kaladin, I think it's appropriate to have a few things held back to be interwoven into the narrative later. Even though each book has a focus flashback character, it doesn't mean we can't have other character flashbacks slipped in when it fits best with the situation.

[Argent]

You know, I've been thinking... We might be misinterpreting the Diagram here. Here's the actual epigraph:

 

They will come you cannot stop their oaths look for those who survive when they should not that pattern will be your clue.

—From the Diagram, Coda of the Northwest Bottom Corner: paragraph 3

 

We've been thinking about broken people, I guess because of the book's description on the website, but even that is not a certain reference to the candidate Radiants. But Shallan doesn't quite fit the model (at least given the level of knowledge we have at the moment), and Ym certainly doesn't seem broken. 

[Leuthie]

Everyone is broken in some way from the time we're born. Think "Original Sin". Pattern chose Shallan because of her ability to draw, her artistic creation sense, which was common for Cryptics in the past. "She made wonderful lies" is how Pattern would put it.

[Aleksiel]

We've been thinking about broken people, I guess because of the book's description on the website, but even that is not a certain reference to the candidate Radiants. But Shallan doesn't quite fit the model (at least given the level of knowledge we have at the moment), and Ym certainly doesn't seem broken. 

 

Having some spiritual wound is a must to be able to bond with a spren, though the wound could appear long before the Nahel bond. Ym has lost his family (he drank his heritage according to Nalan so his parents must have died before that), then lived on the streets. Plenty of opportunities for spiritual wound.

 

His current bonding might be occurring now because the spren just arrived in our realm. We don't have any timeline when it comes to him; his murder could have happened years ago (though I doubt it) or any time during WoR.

[Seloun]

We've been thinking about broken people, I guess because of the book's description on the website, but even that is not a certain reference to the candidate Radiants. But Shallan doesn't quite fit the model (at least given the level of knowledge we have at the moment), and Ym certainly doesn't seem broken. 

 

Syl specifically mentions broken people in relation with Radiants:

 

 

“You want too much of me,” he snapped at her as he reached the other side of the chasm. “I’m not some glorious knight of ancient days. I’m a broken man. Do you hear me, Syl? I’m broken.”

 

She zipped up to him and whispered, “That’s what they all were, silly.” She streaked away.

 

What's somewhat less clear is if all Surgebinders have to be similarly 'broken', though most likely the answer is yes. Pattern also says:

 

 

“I know . . . little of humans,” Pattern said. “They break. Their minds break. You did not break. Only cracked.”

 

She continued her washing.

 

“It is the lies that save you,” Pattern said. “The lies that drew me.”

 

Most spren appear to be drawn to an emotion rather than causing the emotion. Based on what Pattern says, it's most likely necessary for an individual to suffer some trauma then cover it up with the appropriate emotion, e.g. Kaladin's bond really forms when, after Tien's death, he deals with it by protecting people who remind him of Tien.

 

However, we know that Kaladin had flashes of combat-brilliance long before that, and that his combat ability seems to be at least partially tied to his bond with Syl. So it's possible that while Surgebinding requires the full bond (through the break), the extra 'gift' can be developed before then. I'm not sure Kaladin could really have been described as 'broken' before Tien's death.

 

If this is the case, Shallan might not really had to have a 'breaking' before her Mother's death. Her mother may have recognized Shallan's Memory ability (much like how Kaladin has flashes of his combat ability pre-breaking) and have known enough to associated with Lightweaver Surgebinding.

[Velnica]

But Shallan already had a blade beforehand (that she used to kill Mrs. Davar), which means she must've performed the 3rd Nahel bond. Unless I'm reading this all wrong?

[Bramble Thorn]

There must have been a crack before, else she wouldn't have been able to connect to Pattern at all.

 

There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in.

[Leuthie]

Pattern cops to being the cause of all of Shallan's problems in their final scene. Its quite possible that a spren can squeeze into the smallest of cracks, then do things to widen them; actually doing the breaking needed to form the bond.

[Seloun]

But Shallan already had a blade beforehand (that she used to kill Mrs. Davar), which means she must've performed the 3rd Nahel bond. Unless I'm reading this all wrong?

 

My guess is that Shallan didn't have the blade until that moment, i.e. she forms it in response to her mother's attempt to kill her. IIRC there's WoB that also indicates that the different orders get their blades at different points along their progression.

 

Pattern cops to being the cause of all of Shallan's problems in their final scene. Its quite possible that a spren can squeeze into the smallest of cracks, then do things to widen them; actually doing the breaking needed to form the bond.

 

I have a theory about the Recreance that plays off of this. If the spren are capable of 'farming' bonds somehow (by doing something to break likely candidates) and it turns out they've been doing this to the KR post-Last Desolation (possibly encouraged by Tanavast since, you know, all his Heralds bailed on him), that would be something sufficiently betrayal-worthy for the Recreance.

[Ati]

It seems to me that we can be a little more specific about Shallan's bond with pattern.  I believe it is stated that Lightweaver's have only one ideal, and the rest of their progression is based on recognition of truths, seemingly specific to self discovery.  Further, where Syl was drawn to Kaladin's acts to protect those around him, Pattern states specifically (as noted earlier in the thread) that he was drawn to lies.  We've already observed that Shallan has an extremely powerful selective memory.  Her intentionally ignoring conversation pertaining to the truth of her mother's death is a repeated theme in WoR. The implication seems to be that there was some trauma prior to Shallan's mother's death that she also forgot for self preservation.  

 

I'm also curious as to why people are suggesting that Pattern had been unable to manifest as a Blade prior to the struggle with her mother.  I hadn't noticed anything to support that. 

[Aleksiel]

I'm also curious as to why people are suggesting that Pattern had been unable to manifest as a Blade prior to the struggle with her mother.  I hadn't noticed anything to support that. 

 

Because if her mother knew Shallan could have used a shardblade, she wouldn't have openly go against her with a knife. Also, her father would have probably tried to get the blade from Shallan the first time he saw it; it's not a children's toy. So the most reasonable assumption is Pattern first became a blade at that point or at least that was the first time anyone but Shallan found out about it.

[kari-no-sugata]

Pattern does say (chapter 60) that Shallan's images used to be able to produce sound - this would pretty much have to be before her mother's death. This is good evidence that Shallan was doing advanced Lightweaving before she shut down due to her mother's death. I think there was a WoB to that effect too.

 

Two other interesting things for chapter 60: immediately after Pattern mentions Shallan's images being able to produce sound, Shallan has another mental blank (followed by a clear "blink" interestingly). I wonder if we'll ever see Shallan having one of these episodes with others around her. The other interesting thing is this bit:

That was the real Shallan. She knew it as surely as she knew her own name. The person she had become instead was a lie, one she had fabricated in the name of survival. To remember herself as a child, discovering Light in the gardens, Patterns in the stonework, and dreams that became real...

 

This is where she is talking about using lies to save herself (from traumatic experiences) but this last sentence seems to be referring to events prior to her mother's death. While "discovering Light in the gardens" sounds quite harmless ,"dreams that became real" sounds dangerous and frightening. Seems like a pretty clear hint to me - this could be what Pattern is referring to when he says "They break. Their minds break. You did not break. Only cracked" (chapter 13)

 

That being said, Shallan's past is still somewhat of a mystery - some things we know and some things we still have to guess at. I think this is more because Shallan effectively has to gain power by unravelling the lies within herself and if the readers see it all before Shallan does then it loses impact. She seems the opposite to Kaladin in this regard - she gains power due to internal developments (doesn't depends on others) while Kaladin gains power due to external developments (directly depends on relationships with others).

[BrindIf]

Most spren appear to be drawn to an emotion rather than causing the emotion. Based on what Pattern says, it's most likely necessary for an individual to suffer some trauma then cover it up with the appropriate emotion, e.g. Kaladin's bond really forms when, after Tien's death, he deals with it by protecting people who remind him of Tien.

That makes sense.

Lift has the same kind of experience, she explained Darkness she tried not to care, and then started becoming crazy, that she has to care in order to deal with her life.