Can you be two orders of knights radiant at once

[Feruchemical Skybreaker he/him]

Is it possible to be bonded to two different spren and therefore belong to two different orders? And if so could you have access to all four surges granted by those orders (assuming that the orders don't have an overlap of surges)? And on the other hand if they did have overlap would you be more powerful with that surge or not?

[Honorless he/him]

Theoretically, yes

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tganchero (paraphrased)

Is it true that humans can bond to multiple spren?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

They can theoretically bond to multiple spren.

Words of Radiance Lexington signing (March 18, 2014)

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Questioner

One. Can there be Nahel Bonds with more then ten types of spren because we have ten Orders.

Brandon Sanderson

Meaning, are there other possible spren that could form other Orders of Knights Radiant that are not the ten? This is theoretically possible, but that is basically what you could argue is happening to Renarin. So now if you want to say... if you want to throw out the exception of spren who were one of the ten who got changed, then this is theoretically possible but right now currently wouldn't work.

Tel Aviv Signing (Oct. 18, 2019)

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Questioner

Is there a limit to how many Shardblades you can have? Be bonded to?

Brandon Sanderson

Theoretically, not really. There are some things that can limit bound that.. I can imagine people have a lot. In the original draft of The Way of Kings (2002) Amaram had two. And so, it's definitely possible to have multiples, and I had not thought of someone trying to bond every Shardblade. 

Questioner

So that means you can be bonded to more than one spren.

Brandon Sanderson

Well, those Shardblades... Can you be bonded to more than one spren? That question's answer is also yes. Potentially. But there is a much harder limit on that.

Words of Radiance Chicago signing (March 22, 2014)

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Questioner (paraphrased)

Can someone bond more than one Honorblade?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Honorblade?  You can't bond an Honorblade, though it can be given to you. Shardblades, however, come from a spren bond and it is possible to bond more than one.

Footnote: It was later said you can bond multiple Honorblades and Brandon misunderstood the question.
Words of Radiance San Diego signing (March 4, 2014)

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Zeke.0

We've seen that it's possible to bond multiple Shardblades, what about multiple spren?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO!

Footnote: When asked previously, Brandon has stated that it is theoretically possible to bond more than one spren.
General Twitter 2018 (Feb. 28, 2018)

It is possible but do note that spren are sapient beings, not just an inanimate source of human empowerment or a pet. Some spren don't like each other, they might consider the person already taken, they might be repelled due to the nature of the Nahel Bond which joins the soul of the Radiant and the spren, making being a third party tricky, also holding to two different sets of Ideals could be very difficult for the Radiant.

Edited January 7, 2020 by Honorless

[Elegy he/him]

Not impossible but unlikely:

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Questioner

Could someone bond with two spren and wield two swords?

Brandon Sanderson

It is theoretically possible, but the spren aren't going to like it.  So you are not going to see it very often.

Firefight Seattle Public Library signing (Jan. 7, 2015)

Also, fulfilling double the number of oaths must be quite a pain. The protagonists struggle with some of theirs already as it is.

Don't know how surge overlap would work. I would be surprised if they didn't get more powerful though.

Edited January 7, 2020 by Elegy

[Zapata]

technically yes, you can, however the spren wouldn't like it. Another complication is keeping to the Ideals, which would make some orders incompatible. Interestingly enough, being a Lightweaver and anything else would be the easiest to keep the Ideals for, but it seems that most spren dislike Cryptics, so the spren would be less likely to go for it. A Cryptic bonding someone who is already a Radiant, however, might happen as an experiment.

[GoWibble he/him]

Short answer:

Yes. 

Long answer:

Most spren are looking for things that aren't necessarily mutually exclusive but are unlikely to be seen on the same individual. This kind of thing is hard becuase, as the WoB that @Elegy shared, spren are sentient.

 

Edit: Theoretically possible. I'd like to thing that it should work out like we think, but alas, we don't fully know. RaFO

Actually, Honorless fully explained what I was trying to say at the same time as me. See @Honorless' post. 

Edited January 7, 2020 by GoWibble

[Feruchemical Skybreaker he/him]

Thank you

 

[Dunkum he/him]

yea, this question comes up occasionally, and my favorite exampel is that it is really really hard to imagien someone being both a skybreaker and an edgedancer.  their oaths just seem incompatible.  so while there isnt necessarily a physical limitation prevenitng someone from bonding multiple spren, youd have to find spren whose orders require compatible oaths, and youd have to fulfil those oaths.

[Channelknight Fadran]

The easiest solution to this question I can imagine is if a knight radiant grabbed an honorblade (I.E. Shallan with the one Rock was carting around). It makes sense that they could, because if Sanderson's gonna hammer through a good seven or books he's going to need to introduce new abilities.

[teknopathetic he/him]

I wonder if Adolin could bond a spren and use that connection to somewhat bring back his dead-blade through his connection to the new spren.