Isilel

But didn't the Stormfather say at some point that Ishar had been a Bondsmith _before_ he became a Herald? That this was how he had been able to bring humans from Ashyn to Roshar? Personally, I think that he is a Dawnsliver and the Dawnshard he had born is the one mentioned in the Poem of Ista, that could "bind any creature Voidish or mortal".

Honestly, I don't understand why Cultivation didn't point out that Rosharan system used to be more peaceful and prosperous before Odium's arrival and meddling. Or how Odium's actions turned Threnody into the Hell it is.

Hm... But didn't Nomad think to himself that he stopped aging at 38 Rosharan years? And he is a young guy in SA so far, about Kaladin's age. I expected all that stuff to happen in the second half of the series. Would you mind sharing this WoB, please? Yea, but 5 kids within a decade - decade and half? I thought that while it was possible for CS to have kids, it was somewhat difficult. Yet Lady Davar had the most children of any on-screen mother in SA. Sorry, some weird hiccup that I can't completely edit out on my phone.

So the non-Windrunner Radiant in the vision may have been wearing borrowed Plate? From what we have seen so far, with an own Plate a quartermaster's involvement should have been superfluous. That would mean that a borrowed Plate could be dismissed and re-summoned by the borrower, not just the owner. Which is potentially very interesting.

I strongly suspect that Shallan is going to lend Adolin her plate very soon. He is good enough to win against the Fused, but he is squishy and doesn't have stormlight-enhanced endurance. Plate would help with both these things, living plate even more so than dead one. Even if lending plate is normally a Windrunner thing, I bet that the strong Connection with Adolin will still allow Shallan to do this and the armor will stay even if she moves far away.

IIRC, that wasn't that Notum said. He said that killing Kaladin would free Syl in any case, but that before the 5th Ideal there was a way to dissolve the bond _without_ killing him.

Well, not quite a submarine, since there is air down there as long as you don't choke on beads and increased pressure doesn't seem to be a factor... But it could inspire creation of one.

IMHO it was just Sureblood's former bonded spren.

I may be in the minority, but personally I am disappointed that all Bridge Four apart from Renarin and Rlain become Windrunners. I really wanted some of them to join different Orders and Dabbid in particular struck me as a shoe in for Edgedancer after RoW. I mean, his interactions with the Sibling fit "I will listen to those who are ignored" to a t and he generally seems much more along the lines of "loving and healing" than protection and leadership. It comes across as if individual qualities of a Radiant candidate are almost irrelevant for the Order choice, while circumstance of being in Bridge Four is pretty much paramount. I really like your ideas about the connection between Radiant and Testament!

Shouldn't Kelek have recognised her, though? Or noticed/sensed some resemblance at least? And if Venli could detect and track the souls of the Fused by looking into the Cognitive, shouldn't the same work for Heralds as well? Like, Jasnah should have seen something seriously weird about ShaChana's soul when soulcasting around her, ditto the other Lightweavers.

I think that Ishar has born a Dawnshard in the past. In particular the one mentioned in the "poem of Ista" that "can bind any creature mortal or voidish" (paraphrasing) and that's how he had been able to create the Oathpact before he received his honorblade and why he is known as "the binder of gods".

IMHO there is evidence that the nine Heralds can no longer trigger a Desolation and may not be drawn all the way onto Braize when they die. It would seem that Ishar changed the Oathpact immediately prior to/during Aharietam to hinge on Taln alone. There are a number of things that make me think this: 1. Decision to abandon the Oathpact was made even though they didn't know that Kalak had survived. If he had died, then he should have started another Desolation before the year was out, yes? But somehow Ishar and Co. thought that it was feasible to go through with it anyway. This only makes any kind of sense if Kalak no longer mattered. 2. Nale mentioned "certain measures we took" to prevent another Desolation and how (unrestricted) surge-binding could undo them. 3. Jezrien was completely nonchalant and unafraid when he thought that he was being murdered by mundane means. Not like someone fearing torture and being forced to cause the Final Desolation. But like someone who knew from experience that he had nothing to fear. I would also like to point out that in the Chana theory she would have had more than a year to do something after her alleged return, but didn't. Yet, "They mustn't see, they mustn't know!" must have been included for a reason - Stormfather/Faker was afraid of a Herald's reaction to learning something. And who among the Heralds is currently the most active and dangerous? Not Chana, that's for sure. It is also not true that Heralds haven't done much since Aharietam - Ishar, Nale and Kalak have done plenty and were particularly active during the last decade or so, including the series proper. And the timing of Ishar's recent frenzy of activity does roughly fit with him having been the one who died and learned something that he shouldn't have. @CtrlAltDepressed: The Stormfather appeared as an indistinct humanoid figure in RoW. Chapter 107, IIRC or thereabouts.

I have a different theory - Ishar was the Herald who died on the night of Gavilar's assassination. The Stormfather(?) said "They mustn't see! They mustn't know!" when the Herald died and IIRC the whole Tezim thing started shortly afterwards. Ishar saw what he shouldn't have and reacted in his madness. Yes, I know about the Chana theory. I have a number of problems with it, but the main one is - she didn't do anything of note between her alleged death and the current point in the series. The only point of it being her would be to heap even more guilt on Shallan, which is frankly unnecessary and excessive.

I think that it will involve dealing with the Unmade parked in Shinovar in a definitive manner. Whether by Nightblood or by changing it somehow. As to the Heralds, they better not be irrevocably dead! While Herald flashbacks in the second half could work even so, female Heralds so far have been so pitifully inconsequential, that I would be seriously annoyed if WaT proves to be the end of them. They should get similar amount of limelight in the second half as men did in the first! Which would work thematically with the first 5 books being more Honor-focussed (the upper half of Heraldic circle depiction), with the latter part of the series being more Cultivation-y - lower half ditto.

I have long maintained that the voice that spoke to Szeth when he was young and warned him about the upcoming Desolation couldn't have been his current highspren. Because didn't the highspren think that they could prevent one from happening by helping Nale suppress other Orders? So, I used to think that Szeth was in the early stages of bonding a different type of spren and when he accepted being Truthless, the nascent bond dissolved. But maybe it was the Wind talking to him instead? She does ask Kaladin to come to her in Shinovar, perhaps she is particularly strong there and could occasionally speak to people even when Rayse was alive?

Szeth considers himself to be highly educated. And he is demonstrably fluent and literate in a number of languages. For all we know his writing could be scholarly.

They should appear monstrously huge to people from other worlds, though. It would be impossible for them to be inconspicuous. Also, uninvested Rosharans should have a very hard time on other worlds. With higher gravity, less oxygen than they are used to and infections (stormlight prevents most infectious diseases), worldhopping should be pretty deadly for them.

All I can is that it was pretty jarring to me that after their scene together, Kaladin didn't even think about finding and recruiting Vasher during his whole "die hard" routine. IMHO, Sanderson should have included a sentence or 2 about why this wasn't an option. Anyway, Vasher can change his appearance at will, can't he? Though maybe the Fused could sense his investiture somehow. Or those of respective Brands could do what Venli did to track the Fused and look at souls through the Cognitive. What I don't understand is why, after giving anti-voidlight to Gavilar, Vasher didn't do the same for the protagonists, after the Desolation actually happened.

It has been explicitly mentioned in OB that Honor had talked to the Radiants in the past. In particular, he helped them reconcile with the truth of their ancestors actions, when it got re-discovered. But immediately prior to the Recreance he was crazy and raving and told them that they'd destroy Roshar, etc. We also saw Odium talk to people who were strongly enough Connected to him. I do think that Honor may have been among the Shards who can talk better than hear, which is how the custom of burning glyphs to him as prayers or messages may have originated.

Forgot to mention that I have been long convinced that Tanavast's Cognitive Shadow exists independently, hidden within the Stormfather and was behind utterances, dreams and visions of Dalinar's that the Stormfather denied responsibility for. And that now it is up to the same tricks with other people in the new WaT chapters. Oh, and I have a brand-new theory about the Herald who died in the book 5 prologue. It wasn't Chana, it was Ishar. He saw what he "mustn't" have seen, according to the Stormfaker, and made himself a god-king as a result. IMHO the Stormfather's assurance that no Herald has died and went to Braize in the intervening millennia is only true "from a certain point of view" - due to Ishar's changes to the Oathpact after Aharietam, the apostate Heralds no longer go all the way when they die. Let's remember how nonchalant Jezrien initially was when Moash was murdering him. He wasn't at all afraid, was he? He didn't even try to defend himself. He knew that he wasn't in danger of Braize, methinks. Anyway, it has always bothered me about the Chana theory that nobody in the Davar family mentioned how Lady Davar died on the same day as when this other very important assassination happened. And that Chana didn't do anything of note between the end of WoK and the end of RoW. So what's the point of it being her beyond heaping even more trauma on poor Shallan? Odium's forces have already found a way to bypass Taln, the Final Desolation was imminent either way. Let my theories be recorded.

IMHO, it is absolutely the same voice and the same entity that was also behind a couple of Dalinar's dreams/visions that the Stormfather denies responsibility for, was masquerading as Nohadon in the changed vision and had also been the Stormfaker in Gavilar's prologue. I.e.: "You are not the one I need" in the end with Gavilar to "You are what I need" now with Kaladin. This is a clear connection. And IMHO it is Tanavast's Cognitive Shadow. I have been saying for a long time that some pre-recorded messages do not a CS make and that the Stormfather's core personality is clearly very much his own and that of a spren that has never been human. It would make sense that Tanavast chose not to go the Fused way and replace the SF's mind with his CS, but to have it exist independently within the Stormfather, hidden from Odium. I also think that Kaladin will either Ascend to Honor or follow Dalinar as SF's Bondsmith. There is already a pretty strong Connection between them and Kaladin's retreat from the battlefield mirrors Dalinar's before him.

The epigraphs - chapter 1 could be Shallan, Szeth or Kaladin. Chapter 2 is Kaladin, IMHO. The voice on the winds talking to Kaladin is the same entity as the Stormfaker, right? They go from telling "You are not the one I need" to Gavilar to "You are what I need" to Kaladin. I am in the camp of this being Tanavast's Cognitive Shadow. It is odd that the voice insinuates that it is in Shinovar, but maybe it just needs Kaladin to be there. I have long thought that Kaladin will either Ascend or become a Bondsmith at the end of book 5 and the former seems ever more likely. Yes, his farewell to his family seems pretty final. I also don't like the romancy vibes between him and Syl... but they also look a lot like death flags for her. She doesn't have to die for him to do either of these things, but after these couple of chapters it feels likely to me that she will. Something occured to me regarding Vasher - I am going on a record here that I deeply dislike the Chana Davar theory, not the least because it would feel incredibly contrived if King Gavilar and Lady Davar had died on the same day and no family member ever commented on it. I mean, his death was a huge event of great importance to the Vorin area of Roshar and it would have been quite a coincidence. Besides, there is zero follow-through on "they mustn't see, they mustn't know" as to our knowledge Chana didn't do anything of note after the end of WoK and until now. So, my theory a bit out of the left field is - the Stormfather's "no Herald has died and gone to Braize since" (paraphrasing) is true "from a certain point of view". Due to how the Oathpact was changed so that Taln could maintain it alone and weakened for all the others, the Herald who died didn't go all the way to Braize, but saw whatever shouldn't be seen. And that Herald was Ishar, not Chana. And it resulted in him proclaiming himself a god-king, which, IIRC was a relatively recent development. Finally, Shallan's scene with Testament was touching, but I am a bit leery of "whatever it takes".

Let me see: I guessed that Gavilar had been getting the same visions as Dalinar did... after WoK, I think. Also, that Ehlokar was seeing Cryptics. I theorised that Nale set up Gavilar's assassination, since he couldn't do it personally due to his legal code, after WoR, IIRC. I maintained that Navani would become a Bondsmith after OB, due to her tendency to bring people together and attract glory spren. I was one of the early adopters of the idea that Taravangian and Lift also met Cultivation. Ditto about Adolin reviving Maya. Ditto WaT reading spoiler For some reason my clairvoyance-fu only worked with Stormlight Archive. Anyway, theories for book 5: Kaladin will become a Bondsmith or Ascend to Honor. Not original, I know. Dalinar will become a Fused or die for good. Nale was setting up Szeth and Nightblood as his "suicide by cop" escape hatch, since he couldn't see a way to resolve the conflict between what his twisted moral code and madness are compelling him towards and what he can bear to do. It is going to happen. Taln is great, but he didn't hold out for 4.5 millenia due to his will alone - Ishar changed the Oathpact in a way that made it impossible for him to give in, as well as allowed him to lock down the Fused alone. That's why Ishar and Jezrien went ahead with abandoning the Oathpact despite not knowing whether Kalak also died or not. It wouldn't have mattered if he did, despite not being remotely as steadfast as Taln. Unregulated powers of the Radiants might have somehow interfered, though, hence Ishar setting Nale to suppress all other Radiant Orders after the Recreance, when Honor was in the process of dying. Ishar is a Dawnsliver. That's how he played a prominent role in destruction of Ashyn and created the Oathpact _before_ receiving a Bondsmith honorblade. Possibly also how he founded the Radiant Orders and later changed the Oathpact, so it could rest on a single person. I wonder about how he managed to keep the Dawnshard out of Odium's clutches while on Braize, though. Maybe he hid it on Roshar and only took it up again briefly to achieve the latter 2 things? I am not sure that it is the same one that Rysn currently bears, but it is the one from the poem of Ista, IMHO, said "to bind all creatures voidish or mortal", IIRC. Lady Davar (whether Chana or not) was a Ghostblood and was training Shallan to be an undercover agent for them. Which is why many of Veil's skills were actually real. Her memories of a happy childhood pre-bonding are another lie, as was strongly hinted at in the scene in OB where she performed "The Girl Who Looked Up" for Pattern. At some point Shallan refused to play along and particularly to use her Radiant abilities for them. The tragedy was a result of her mother trying to scare Shallan into demonstrating her surge-binding for an associate. As Pattern pointed out, Mraize's letter contained lies, yet it is often treated as solid evidence. And the rest of information in it seems true, as far as we know. I also think that there is some particular connection between the Davars and BAM. Maybe they are descendants of Melishi?

Some belated thoughts: P.S. but potentially very impactful - bad things were happening with BAM _before_ her imprisonment! This is huge. So apparently it wasn't _just_ about de-fanging the parsh. She was already crashing, with potentially dire consequences. And Kalak thinks that the Heralds(?) if that's who "we" applies to, betrayed her somehow? I have been torn between Tanavast's Cognitive Shadow and Ishar as candidates for the Stormfaker since the draft reading a couple of years back, and now in this final version, I am convinced that it is the former. It never sat well with me that unlike all the other examples, a series of pre-recorded messages was supposed to constitute a CS. It makes much more sense IMHO, if there was a hidden personality within the Stormfather that occasionally took over. I also think that Tanavast was maskerading as Nahadon in the changed vision and sent Dalinar the dreams/visions that the SF is unaware of. Though, admittedly, that could also have been Cultivation. Oh, and we have known since WoK prelude that Ishar can't feel a normal death of a Herald, since he was unsure of Kalak's survival after Aharietam. The Oathpact, however, was between the Heralds and Honor and Honor directly fuelled them, so there was a Connection that should have let him feel their deaths. I guess that Tanavast's CS still has it. This being out of the way and apart from Vasher!!! that has been mentioned enough already, there are a few very intriguing tidbits: "I thought... your family" - Kholin family was, for some reason, particularly attractive to SF/Tanavast's CS, there is something special about them. Which may address the frequent complaint about so many of them becoming Radiants, which I somewhat share. It is very odd that Gavilar doesn't consider Jasnah as anything other than Amaram's path to the throne. I mean, he inwardly aknowledges Navani's worth and thinks about involving her. But about his genius daughter and how she might be a valuable resource to exploit? Nothing. I was also surprised by the complete absence of Aesudan. In OB and RoW prologue it seemed that she was working with Gavilar fairly closely and was aware of things which he seems to be keeping secret here. Though her impression that he was searching for an ancient spren appears to be false? Apparently, he wasn't on the looking for BAM train. "They mustn't see... they mustn't know" - is there something ominous that a Herald would learn by dying and going to Braize? Or would they even be drawn there, with the Oathpact as it is? Is it just the Everstorm, or is there something more? But seriously, what's the deal with Vasher working for Gavilar, but then not giving anti-Voidlight to Our Protagonists once the Desolation actually started? I guess that he might have needed to figure out how to change stormlight into something that he could consume, rather than getting this ability via a deal with the Nightwatcher/Cultivation, as thought previously? So, he would have needed resources for his research and approached the king? Hm... not sure about this.

My understanding is that lighteyes don't undergo permanent eye-color changes, either from the dead blades or from living ones/ surge-binding. In fact, we don't know that honorblades cause one at all. Szeth had his for years and used it, but his normal eye-color remained _dark_ green. I.e. he looked dark-eyed unless he summoned the sword or inhaled stormlight. Ditto the dark-eyed Heralds, of course, but judging by Nale, they don't get affected by spren-bonds or even temporarily by active surge-binding either. IIRC, not even by summoning a spren/honorblade.