dvoraen

One thing I will say about the whole Shallan v Re-Shephir thing is that it was a very circumstantial victory. I think it was only possible because it was at Urithiru (where Re-Shephir was likely imprisoned) and with a Lightweaver present. People were glossing over one rather critical passage: The only reason the Unmade didn't do that from the start, was because she wanted to try and learn how spearmen fight. I think had Shallan not been there, that would have inevitably happened. The Unmade probably would not have tired from remaking her critter army over and over again, while her opponents would've eventually been overcome by their own fatigue. Some people were calling it anti-climatic, and in a way it was, but I really doubt it will be in any other circumstances. After all, Shallan doesn't (yet?) know how to imprison Re-Shephir. As soon as her bluff is seen for what it was, and it was a bluff, I rather doubt Re-Shephir will run away in fear of imprisonment or worse.

Hmm, now I'm wondering, because it makes a kind of sense: If Re-Shephir was imprisoned (at Urithiru?), does that make her the Unmade that's able to mold the listeners into other forms, since Re-Shephir can "create" Midnight Essence to mimic what already exists?

I get the feeling that had Re-Shephir managed to tear away the Nahel bond, two things would've happened: 1) Shallan would've joined the "screaming faces" there. 2) Re-Shephir's sapience would've increased if not progressed to self-awareness. Somebody please ask Brandon about whether or not the sapient Unmade came about from consuming those with a Nahel bond. (Not just any people, but those that had the 'hole' the Unmade could hypothetically fill and exploit/devour the rest.)

You can still "break" a spren while retaining pieces of it, as Sylphrena has said ("Break a spren, and she's still there. Sort of." WOR hb p1044). How that looks Cognitively I don't know, but it wouldn't surprise me if breaking a bead in Shadesmar means you end up with multiple (smaller?) beads.

Spark's spren type made me go a strange route for identification. I want to call it genesisspren, partly because we haven't really seen a huge number of spren that veer towards Cultivation's side of the spectrum. The reason why I go this route is, as I said, odd, partly because "wanting to know what's inside" made me think of "what seed did it sprout from", as well as the play on the name Spark being along the lines of "the Spark of life", and so on. For this spren type, I'm thinking they care so much about breaking things, because "they want to see what idea they were" originally, the "core" of that object. In the Cognitive Realm of Roshar, that translates into breaking the 'bead' open to see what the spren is in it, only it translates as going postal in the Physical Realm. This then leads to them being attracted to people who "want to know what someone is made of" (the tough guy approach), albeit in a more psychopathic manner. Does that make sense at all to anyone? EDIT - I think the direction I'm going with this, is that I think Releasers are vigilantes in The Punisher sense.

Personally, I don't think the entity Shallan saw is one of the Unmade. A Splinter of Odium doesn't really strike me as something that would run away from a not-fully-sworn Radiant without him/her being a significant threat. I think what we're seeing in Urithiru is a "curse" brought about by the presence or the attention of an Unmade. It's the source of what's going on, but it's not what's directly causing the "mirrored" violence. I'd say it's some poor soul that got shackled into detecting and re-enacting violent acts, and is likely not the only one doing it.

So I'm one of those thinking that one of the Unmade was captured and imprisoned at Urithiru. We've got plenty of evidence suggesting there's a darkness hanging around, and now we have creepy -- I want to say gholam-like -- entities watching if not murdering people. I don't think it's one of the Unmade directly doing the copycat killings, but rather something one of the Unmade 'Voidbound' into doing that kind of work. We know it's possible for them to enslave entities with their powers (the listener race, Sja-anat's touch on spren), so it stands to reason it could be happening here as well. Plus, we still have some Unmade that haven't even been named -- perhaps "defined" is a better choice of words, since people describe them as "spren" -- to us readers. I still hold that they embody Physical/Cognitive/Spiritual destruction, though. Yelig-nar -- likely Physical destruction (slaughtering all of Nohadon's men of words by "breaking into the chancery" which implies Physical Realm interaction) Moelach -- likely Spiritual destruction ("his touch seeps into a soul...") Re-Shephir -- likely Physical destruction (Midnight Essence) Dai-gonarthis -- likely Cognitive destruction ("holds my sorrow and consumes it") Nergaoul -- likely Cognitive destruction (The Thrill overriding sense and morality) Sja-anat -- possibly Spiritual destruction (changing Identity(?) to something else) ??? ??? ???

Honestly, I think the term Voidbringer has become quite the misnomer, in terms of to whom it applies. I think it's meant to apply towards anyone/-thing that utilizes the art of Voidbinding -- hello the Unmade, 'possessed' listeners in their forms of power, and quite likely humans -- not strictly just the listeners in specific forms. It's pretty clear that the listeners at Narak were not antagonistic before the bonding of Voidspren began. (I seriously hope one of the interludes is Venli thinking back on how things got to where they are now.) Heck, for all we know the Unmade were originally called the Voidbringers before they effectively exploited the listener race.

I think it's either Dalinar telling the Nightwatcher, or someone telling one of the Unmade (or Unmade-controlled listener/human) that.

So after reading all this, I just have one question to whomever: Anyone want to wager on Kaladin finding out firsthand where Nergaoul is? I think it's pretty obvious the listeners are being guided toward one of the Unmade so as to be properly shackled and transformed by their "gods", and the most likely candidate for the Alethkar region would be Nergaoul (because of the Thrill's strength). For the next topic, I'm going to go with pridespren for the 'species' of Voidspren that speaks to Kaladin. The reason has to do with her overall mannerisms in how she treats Kaladin. It would also explain how she found these listeners, because it's very clear that they think themselves as better than slaves for sure.

Pretty much. She said as much during WoR as well when she created the illusion of herself curled up and ... empty inside, in effect showing who she really is. However, she doesn't want to admit to herself that's who and what she is, so she lies to herself by way of saying "I'm this person", even though it's nothing more than a mask. She buries the broken and emotionally destroyed version of herself with lies about who she is, via adopting personae. Even "Shallan" is a lie, the quotes signifying that we're still seeing a facade, one that she's corroborated somewhat (again in WoR) "in the name of survival." The problem that Pattern is tuning into ("can't you tell?") is that she's taking it too far, building a web of lies around the truth at her core and trying to pass it off to herself as the real deal, enough so that she's even starting to question whether she's deluded herself in other matters. In other words, interpreting actual truths (memories of things she's done) as if they were fraudulent as well. "Did I tell myself this is what happened when it didn't?"

While I logically think Ialai Sadeas or the Ghostbloods are the most likely, I had to click on the 'Adolin doesn't know it yet' option, because something's niggling at me but I need more time to brood on it.

Not a squire, no, but something specific to Bondsmiths that could only happen with Dalinar. I think it's more related to the Bondsmith's Resonance/Order-specific ability. I'm of a mind that they can literally make binding oaths, especially if the other party reciprocates.

Something I found interesting was the nature of the wedding ceremony. It was literally an exchange of oaths, before a being who is effectively the arbiter of the system of Radiant advancement. Anyone want to go on a limb with me and say that a bond was forged between Dalinar and Navani, and that there will be interesting side-effects from it? (For example, one knowing where the other is.)

One thing I will say in passing is that with the confirmation of the Unmade numbering nine, you can probably categorize them in groups of three: Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual forms of destruction. Physical - Yelig'nar, Re'Shephir, ??? Cognitive - Sja'anat? Dai'gonarthis? Nergaoul? Spiritual - Moelach, ???, ???

Jasnah already seems to know where the Kholinar Oathgate is. This info is buried in Words of Radiance in one of Shallan's later chapters, however I don't have the exact quote on hand at the moment. Also, nine shadows to destroy them all, and in the Void bind them. Because I'm totally wanting to make Tolkien references.

My answer to this poll was 'multiple choice'. I know I won't be able to get it on Day One, because our primary bookstore (Hastings) went out of business and so there's nothing to fill the void. This means I'll have to see if I can get it delivered from ordering online, and that'll take time. Cue the need for placing a hold at the library, answer number two. This is what I had to do for Arcanum Unbound; the library had it ready before my order arrived. >_>

I did say it was wild speculation, didn't I? But yes, I too think it was an arranged marriage; I just wish we knew more about Restares in general, since he seems to be heavily in the Vorin-Alethi pot.

If we want to go down the speculation path of the hints to the end of the series, I think it's been given in a much more obvious manner: a Death Rattle. A ketek Death Rattle, to be more precise. I feel it has answers in it, but I haven't really set about putting my inner rambling to cohesive thought (forum posts) yet.

I've been meaning to post a topic about Aesudan for a while, but I haven't been able to really come up with anything aside from a VERY wild piece of speculation/theorizing, that being: Is Queen Aesudan the daughter of Restares? There have been two major points that have led me in this direction: 1) The fact that Aesudan is clearly of high standing in Alethi/lighteyed society, and that she thinks VERY highly of herself and "proper" behavior (ref. her reaction to drunken Dalinar in WoR's prologue). 2) Jasnah and the ardent Pai both consider her a threat, in their own ways. For Jasnah, she found and recruited a notorious assassin to be a spy and sleeper on this woman. For Pai, she considers the queen of Alethkar unsuitable for her position, self-indulgent, and more (which apparently has to do with Odium's influence, which probably means one of the Unmade working on her over time*). And yet, she was the one that was allowed to marry Elhokar. I say "allowed" because I get the feeling that convincing Gavilar (and especially Navani) was at best an uphill climb... if it wasn't an arranged marriage. Her standing in society (to say nothing of the dowry) was the prime factor, but it doesn't strike me as unheard of for a marriage to serve as an agreement between two parties for something completely different. If anything, a "proper Vorin marriage" would only legitimize the Sons of Honor more in the eyes of the Alethi, indirectly. * Any takers on it being the same one that was corrupting Lin Davar?

I'm thinking it's because it has ALL of the Orders' glyphs on it, which is being implied to be ... distinctive. Off the top of my head, we haven't seen any other Shardblades with that characteristic.

I've been wondering about this, but I had virtually no ideas as to its significance. My only serious thought on the subject had to be discarded due to the "Bondsmiths never had Shards" statement.

If Jasnah is on the front cover, will we see Dalinar on the interior art as we did with Kaladin/Shallan for Words of Radiance?

Personally, I've interpreted this as Moelach being the actual speaker, as it seems strange that the individual physically giving these words would say "truths I see", as if knowing what was being witnessed. Thus, it didn't make sense to me that it was a Death Rattle.

Right? He's a real pissbag! #SeraFriendIsBestFriend #dragonage On the serious, I don't think we've even gotten HALF of what Gavilar did to initiate "kickoff" of this Desolation, so to speak, but this reading certainly hinted.