Dangerous_Pants

Thank you.

Szeth informs us that all of the honorblades, minus two, are in Shinvoar (I guess to the best of his knowledge, that would be dated information as he hasn't been back in a while). He trained on them all to master the surges. Nahel has his own, which he seemed to have recovered well before the series. That leaves nine. The Windrunner blade he used and is now out in the world. So that's down to 8 left in Shinovar. Only nine blades were left when the heralds abandoned their oathpact, with Talenel's blade returning to Damnation with him (presumably). How did the Shin get Talenel's Oathblade before he came back just prior to the series?

I imagine this has been brought up before, and if so someone please point me in the right direction with my thanks in advance. Ishar was a Bondsmith. He is still alive, but seems inactive as a Bondsmith (maybe due to giving up the blade that provided him those surges?). He would have bonded one of the three, even if he wasn't of his order (Nahel says he is the only one who joined his order). Would he have been the one bonded to the Sibling, and over time Ishar's decay into insanity (or at least what looks like insanity, Nahel implies he stayed sane) have hurt the Bonded Spren to the point it hibernated? Can the Bondsmith Spren unbond themselves? If not, is whatever he bonded to trapped with him until he dies? That would seem unpleasant.

I think it's important for Szeth's reaction to remember that he killed Galivar relatively early in his notoriety, and right up front everyone knew it was at the behest of the Parshmen. He isn't so much a person as a weapon you wish was on your side. Szeth then spent the better part of a decade (while the Alethi were playing War-Fetch on the Shattered Plains) being a force of murderous nature in Jah Kaved. No negotiation, just killing every single person who could make a claim to ruling and thereby stopping a civil war. And the entire time the Alethi just watch it happen, conveniently sidelining Jah Kaved as a functional threat to civil war for the duration of their time at the Shattered Plains. Szeth came once for them with Galivar, but dozens of time for their neighbors. He's more a force of nature in his previous incarnation, and their first interaction with him is as a hired weapon who did his job and left without questions or explanation. The Alethi don't think that assassination is "honorable," but they certainly don't have any compunction against killing one another for fun and profit and kingdom.

That third entity with the arms spread around a blue disc sounds like it would represent ocean. Most of Roshar is water unless there's a giant continent on the other side of the planet we've conveniently ignored so far. Wasn't there an odd spren thing in the purelake that popped up once a day? Could the entire purelake be a slumbering spren? If Urithiru was "Closest to Honor" did he perhaps reside on one of the moons, insofar as a god had to reside anywhere? Could Odium have come with a third moon as a means of moving the population from Braize? Is there any reason to know that a third splinter on Roshar (presuming that is that the Sibling is) is from Honor Cultivation or Odium? Couldn't it have been assigned to another Shard entirely that never resided on the planet?

Wasn't it said that there were Spren via Adonalsium on Roshar before. Could that be the "made" part, and Odium came in afterwards and unmade (broke/correupted) them to suit his purposes?

I think Honor knew he was going to die after a longer losing fight, and set up his power splintering to allow for someone to pick it back up and put it together. They reference many times that when Honor was alive the surges were safer to use due to Honor governing them. And several times it is mentioned that without Honor to do this, humanity risks destroying things. Honor's power is still around in full force, but largely unclaimed. As shown in Mistborn that power is easily enough to reshape/make planets at minimum. But currently it is (mostly) mindless power with specific rules, running more of less on autopilot after the pilot died. It's hugely dangerous because as Dalinar discovered in Ascending there is very little limit on what can be done with the power and how much of that power can be commanded in the right situation. Also, I definitely think Nohadon is still alive. Not only could cognitive shadows stick around if they got close enough to Ascending (i.e. Kesler), Odium has demonstrated a shard can make dead mortals stick around in the cognitive realm as long as is needed. While he uses it for his own ends, what would prevent other Shards from doing that for their key players as well, assuming the key players consented? Or hell, why couldn't Nohadon have just retired after death to the cognitive realm if he at some point Ascended enough (or was somehow invested enough) to resist the pull to the spiritual realm indefinitely?

Not that it's anywhere referenced, but I think that was a deal Honor made with Odium to keep him on Roshar. Odium is bound by his word to stay, reinforced with some amount of Honor's power, and in exchange Honor was weakened enough for Odium to kill him. Tanavast died, but it does seem there was some intelligent divesting of his his power into splinters beforehand. I think he planned to fight a losing battle as a result of binding Odium to Roshar and planned to eventually have someone else pick up the Honor Shard after putting it back together, so he split his power up into the Honorblades and other splinters like the Stormfather.

I don't think it's a physical jail kind of restriction. Honor acted to contain Odium after Domination and Devotion were shattered. Honor's power is largely centered around being bound to your word. I believe Honor gave Odium the ability to kill him in exchange for Odium's word, bound by Honor's power, that he would not leave unless allowed. Odium was willing to take that bait, or had to, as he is driven to destroy the other shards. How could he pass up a free kill? You see several times in Oathbringer that Odium is very, unusually specific about keeping to the letter AND intent of his agreements. First with Dalinar, actually warning him off making a bad decision in the first visited vision. He doensn't let Dalinar let him leave free and clear. He, for some reason, advises him against it. The second time is near the end, when he makes it overwhelmingly clear he will stick to the spirit of his deal with Taravangian. I find this very odd behavior for Odium. It doesn't seem in his nature (shard or person) to be so specific. I suspect that he had to take in part of Honor, corrupting himself so to speak, in order to seal the deal. This gave him a power advantage over Tanavast and let Odium/Rayse eventually kill him personally (but not shatter Honor but so much, it seems). Also possible Honor/Tanavast did the "honorable" thing and simply let Odium kill him as part of the deal (would have been a hell of a negotiation). Perhaps why Odium was able to kill a him despite Cultivation and her power being right there. One could imagine Cultivation's shard bearer would have been devastated by her former/current lover's sacrifice, but it was in his nature to do it. Also would fit in with Odium's intention not to capture other Shard's power. If it only takes a little bit of Honor to bind him to the deal he made, imagine what a larger amount of another Shard would make him.

In Dalinar's vision when the Heralds refuse to return to Damnation, Honor tells them he must unite "them." Does he mean Roshar as a single unified nation, or does he mean the blades? It seems the Honor has splintered his power into very significant chunks in those blades, similar to how Odium has his 10 unmade. The Stormfather indicates their power is much more significant than just using the surges they convey to the wielder. Odium can't/won't claim the Honor's power as not to corrupt himself. As Tanavast is dead, but isn't that saying that Honor's power is free to be claimed if it could be put into one place? Tanavast somewhat preemptively shattered Honor before he died, but Odium doesn't seem to have shattered him quite like (or as thoroughly) is alluded he did to Ambition/Domination/Devotion. Is it officially said anywhere that he shattered Honor, or just that he killed Tanavast? Those seem like very different things. If those 10 blades were united/combined, would they approximate to Sazed being able to pick up the shard like Ruin and Preservation were picked up by Sazed in the Mistborn Series? Wouldn't that be exactly what Odium wouldn't want, someone else, capable and not yet molded into insanity by the Shard's intent, to wield the power of Honor against him (and perhaps in league with Cultivation, putting him at a huge power disadvantage). It was stated in Oathbringer that Odium didn't destroy the Stormfather because he feared a strike from Cultivation. That implies the balance of power is very close. Does Shinovar serve as a repository of those blades for him to ensure that nobody can achieve that unification? If he can't destroy them, the next best thing is to keep them out of the game or at least significantly dislocated from one another? If I were honor, and I knew I was going to die (perhaps as a result of disbursing his power in the first place), wouldn't the best way forward be to ensure someone else could pick up the power? Tanavast dying doesn't seem to be the problem, it's that there isn't another righteous heir to the Honor Shard to apply it's power against Odium. It doesn't much seem like any planet of just people, however united, could stand against one of the 16 without their own shard.