luluzulu

I was processing books for the library at my school, and I decided to take a look at the beautiful endpaper maps and diagrams for the copy of The Way of Kings that had just come in. I noticed that on the "Double Eye" diagram of the radiant orders, the two orders in the center were the Bondsmiths and the Truthwatchers. This interested me, and got me to start wondering why the Truthwatchers are in the center with the Bondsmiths, who we know were the leaders and generals of the Knights Radiant. Here are a few of my theories: Truthwatchers are close to Cultivation like Bondsmiths are close to Honor - Some problems with this one: We don't really know if the Bondsmiths are specifically closer to Honor than other orders like the Windrunners. All we know is that Dalinar is bonded to the Stormfather, the godspren of Honor, and I think the prevailing theory is that there are three Bondsmiths, each bonded to a different godspren. We also know that Truthwatchers aren't bonded to a godspren - Renarin is bonded with a spren named Glys, not the Nightwatcher. A different direction with this theory would be that the surges, not the orders, are what's important on this chart. This would mean that some surges are more associated with Cultivation, and others with Honor, i.e. Feruchemy with Preservation and Hemalurgy with Ruin. This would just mean that Illumination and Progression just happened to be the most closely associated with Cultivation, and Adhesion and Tension with Honor. This still brings up some interesting thoughts about what this could mean for Truthwatchers. Like Bondsmiths, Truthwatchers are a key support Order - So far, what we know of the Bondsmiths' abilities seem to be providing support for other Radiants Following this idea, it would also seem to fit with the few details that we know about the Bondsmiths from Words of Radiance. According to their epigraph, they were the generals of the Radiants - leadership, but also support. From this, we can infer that by their placement on the chart, Truthwatchers are also a powerful support Order (although, the "powerful" part may just be wishful thinking about Renarin - wouldn't it be awesome if the character that everyone thought was weak turned out to be one of the most powerful?). Another thing that may hint at this is The key here is that it's not something that directly relates to Renarin - more so to Adolin. Therefore, it could be reasoned that this is a kind of "support" ability. It doesn't really mean anything and it's just how the diagram happened to be laid out - This is unlikely, considering it's Brandon we're dealing with here. Everything means something. E V E R Y T H I N G. As Kelsier would say, there's always another secret. Please tell me what you guys think, and if you have any theories about why the Truthwatchers are in the center of the Double Eye - I would love to read them!

@john203 and @Andy92 thanks for your answers!!! Not really important questions, but ones that've been kinda bugging me for a while

@Andy92 Thanks, I was wondering when the books were planned to be released. I hope they're as awesome as S.A. is so far! (P.S. I like your profile icon!)

I really like this theory, but personally I'm a big fan of the theory that The Diagram, even though it says to do stuff like keeping Kaladin away from Dalinar to halt his progression as a Radiant, is actually helping to move the progresion of the Radiants forwards by accurately predicting how other Taravangians would react to The Diagram. I just think that it would be an awesome twist if it turns out the Diagram was helping the whole time. I can see how the two theories would work together also, with the trick being constructed by a Spiritual Taravangian who realized that what the Cognitive Taravangian is trying to do is wrong, and used his awesome timeline-sense to craft the trick , which would be double-awesome! Side Note: Cognitive Taravangian seems to want to halt the return of the Radiants, as does Nalan/Darkness. Are they maybe connected in some way, or just working towards similar goals?

Questions!!! 1. How many squires can one Radiant have? Is it a finite number or based off of their abilities/traits? 2. What exactly are the abilities of a squire? Can they benefit from stormlight but not surgebind, or can they surgebind but much more weakly than a Radiant? 3. Do Alethi (and Veden) have epicanthic folds? 4. Which is physically stronger - someone holding a lot of stormlight, or a pewter misting? 5. Is Vivenna a worldhopper alongside Vasher? 6. How many volumes are planned for White Sand? 7. Is Dragonsteel planned for after, or during Stormlight Archive? 8. Which of the Cosmere books is your favorite? Which magic system is your favorite? 9. Which city in all of the Cosmere would you live in if you had a choice? 10. How will allomantic, feruchemical, and hemalurgic powers have changed by Mistborn era 3? 10 1/2. Please come to Seattle?

Definitely a tie between Stormlight and Harry Potter for me, but I voted HP because I figured SA would have a lot of votes on its own forum

Looking forward to Kaladin finally being storming happy about something and not consumed by revenge or depression