Isilel

Except that considerations like that wouldn't affect the Stormfather, who is very protective of the Sibling. Personally, I still think that it is most likely that they are half-and-half Honor/Cultivation and a neuter. Right, and I strongly suspect that we'll see somebody visit the Valley and bond the Nightwatcher in the next book. IMHO, it will be Rlain, who'll go there to ask for a boon that would help save the singers from Odium, but a pretty good case has been made for Rock, too. Not sure if Cultivation is actually most present there, though - Purelake and Horneater peaks also seem to be likely locations for being "closest" to her. As far as we know, yes. And some non-native ones may have adapted to grow them too, like the Ryshadium. Though, IIRC there is no incontrovertible confirmation for that. Still, they appear to be connected to spren like the skyeels and greatshells are.

Come on, now! This quote: "Kaladin had never had much time for art. Either the picture depicted something useful - like a map - or it was basically pointless". Chapter 102, "Celebrant". is from Kaladin's own PoV! It is when he is visiting the spren art merchant and when he also sees the picture from the court of Gods. I am pretty sure that the issue of over-protectiveness comes up during the training of his squires, but I am not going to hunt for quotes, as I am not really trying to convert anybody. Look, some posters here have repeatedly asked for opposing opinions and I have provided mine, along with some of the evidence that helped me form it. That is all.

Is it an integral part of her character development or more of a symptom of underlying problems? Shallan's conflict is rooted in the past and it won't be solved by her chosing one man over another, anymore than Dalinar's conflict was solved by marrying Navani. Like him, she'll have to confront and assimilate her past and her love interest(s) could only have a tangential role in this, providing support in the best case, being a distraction in the worst. Her brothers, alive and dead are going to furnish impetus for the crisis, because they, and not any romantic entanglements were at the root of Shallan's trauma, they are the victims of her self-defense, they were the ones thoughts of whom she suppressed in order to function even before her fragmentation started in earnest. No, Veil was initially created just as a disguise and was gradually fleshed out more and more into a full-blown sub-persona or a role that got out of hand, if you will. Shallan only starts to use her to tackle things/ as an escape in OB. Radiant was expressly created as a means to deal with Pattern-as-a-Blade and perhaps Shallan feeling a pressure to provide a shining example, but feeling unworthy due to her past, and remained pretty rudimentary. This is not true. I have just re-read part IV and every time when situation is critical, Shallan is Shallan in her PoV and she is very brave and cool-headed indeed. Persona-shifting only happens during the downtimes in that segment. This would be quite a trick, as Jasnah is neither of these things herself, nor does she have much use for them in others. She was trying to recall Shallan, the curious, enthusiastic scholar, and figure out what was wrong with her ward, nothing more. 'Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?' Ahem. IMHO, the conflict is more about Shallan's attempt to escape and erase her past and edit herself into a different person to accomplish it - not her _growing_ into a different person naturally, mind, which is normal and healthy. Jasnah just brought into light what was happening already - Shallan wanted to escape into Veil more and more. That's why she was skipping meetings and not paying attention when present. Nor did Shallan put her shortcomings into her personas - with the notable exception of her attraction to Kaladin. But that is also connected with her suppressing the truth of Helaran, so it makes a certain amount of sense. I am not characterizing Kaladin in any way and I freely admit that the similarities are superficial. Still, wouldn't somebody who has been burned as badly as Shallan, keep wondering whether his anger might escape the leash one of these days? Her father started as caring too - towards her, at least. I didn't say that it would have been a rational assessement of the situation, but I, personally, think that it should have been a reflexive turn-off. Something that very well could have been overcome upon prolongued association, but not that quickly and easily. Well, it's all about expectations, right? Few romances in fiction strike me as "magical", particularly if they end in an (often contrived) "Happily Ever After". It doesn't help that most of them tend to be quite predictable and formulaic. For some reason I feel that the authors tend to do better, to write something genuinely touching and believable with tragical romances... And with all respect, I'd certainly not expect a "magical" romantic relationship from Sanderson - it is not his strength. So, I was hoping for it to not be too annyoing and too tropy and it was that. See, for me "symbolic evidence" weighs much less than boring and straightforward stuff like: Pattern liking Adolin, having repeated interactions with him, which seem to be leading to the 2 developing an actual comradely relationship. Adolin genuinely admiring and appreciating Shallan's art and having an artistic streak himself, while: "Kaladin had never had much time for art. Either the picture depicted something useful - like a map - or it was basically pointless". Chapter 102, "Celebrant". Pattern's admonitions about Shallan remembering her Truths only happening in her Veil persona, never Shallan. In fact the very reason that Shallan needs her personas is that she can't forget her past, but also can't assimilate it and it debilitates her. Yes, she is the scholarly one, after all. And she is almost always very rational and clear-thinking when in critical/dangerous situations But it wasn't just an ommission, like in those other examples, it was clearly signposted by Shallan's frantic expectation of the reaction and her constant wondering why it didn't come, which is absolutely not how it plays here or in those other cases I pointed out and some more that I didn't. My favorite characters are Jasnah and Dalinar, but I like Adolin, yes. I very much enjoy the fact that a character that would have normally have been killed off early to clear the way for an "unlikely hero" like Kaladin or Renarin, was fleshed out into an ongoing and somewhat important character instead. This, of course also applies to my favs - all of them would have been roadkill within the first half of a stereotypical epic fantasy novel at the latest. I was disappointed that he wasn't given space to react to the drastic changes in his world - a normal(ish) person's emotional response to the apocalypse, to the sudden fall of their supposedly powerful homeland, to "deaths" and "ressurections" of people close to him, to change of his place in the world, etc. was sorely missed. For me it was a much greater disappointment than a possibly lacking romance. Yes, the marriage was hasty - but it is wartime and the end of the world rolled into one. Waiting until things are properly figured out isn't feasible in these circumstances. After both of them nearly dying a few times in a row, Shallan is only following Wit's advice about "drinking life" while she can or something along these lines. And generally, as I have said in my previous post, I would find an even greater concentration on the 2 of the 3 main characters that would necessarily result from a properly developed Shalladin romance, to be extremely problematic to the narrative. The scope needs to open up if we are to take the whole "a good chunk of the world and it's different peoples fighting for their survival" thing seriously, not to narrow down even further. Right? I really don't understand why jerks who frighten or even hurt the heroine early on are supposed to be super-attractive. One of the reasons why I don't like most romances in fiction, as this is such a common trope. I read most of them and even liked them despite another common toxic trope that I hate - "all other women are jealous of the heroine, so she can only be friends with men". What is it with the desire to make the heroine a queen-bee? Is this a paranoid fear of competition or the ingrained view of women as "lesser", so that associating exclusively with men makes the heroine inherently superior to the rest of her flawed gender? To be fair, it gets somewhat better and the trope isn't quite as overt and common now as a few years ago, but... Anyway, I liked the books well enough, but they have gotten repetitive and kind of leading nowhere interesting, so I stopped a couple of installments ago. Kaladin's whole arc in OB is struggle with over-protectiveness towards people whom he considers to be "family". If he and Shallan started a relationship, this would have certainly become an issue, particularly after it becomes clear that Radiants are not, in fact, immortal.

I have been very wary of jumping down this rabbit-hole of a thread, because I generally dislike how romances in SF/fantasy tend to affect female protagonists and distort/preempt other plots in order to feature more relationship drama or to showcase the awesomeness of the male love interest, who often ends up overshadowing the heroine as a result and/or blocking other characters from becoming involved in the action. This stuff consistently prevents urban fantasy series with interesting premises and worldbuilding from reaching their true potential and producing something truly brilliant. IMHO, YMMV. To add insult to injury it is mostly very formulaic and predictable - mutual dislike at first, a broody male love interest brimming with leashed passion, who is an unparalleled warrior, suffers from over-protectiveness complex, a heroine who struggles with her traumatic past/identity... you can see where all of this is going. Can these tired clichés be done well? Sure, but romances aren't Sanderson's strong suit, even though he has done alright with Mistborn Era 2 and to an extent with Warbreaker. And there are so many much more interesting to me mysteries, characters and plots in SA that I can't help but begrudge the space that it would take to do so properly. The notions of what constitutes evidence are hardly unbiased here, though . Here is a parade example: This quote has led to theories about how Shallan would need to divorce Adolin to save Pattern from dying earlier in the thread, yet _this_ comes shortly after: "Syl", kaladin repeated. "We jumped hand-in-hand, but she let go". And, funnily enough gets soundly ignored. No furious theorising about how Syl will abandon Kaladin or he will kill her yet again, no far-reaching predictions about his character. Crickets. Never mind that there was actually a very good reason for Shallan to prioritize Adolin, who, of them all, was in most immediate danger of suffocating if she lost him in the beads, as the only human unable to inhale stormlight in their group, while there is no such excuse for Kaladin/Syl. And there is another issue - Sanderson sometimes just glosses over/leaves out expected emotional responses and pay-offs. It is a feature or flaw of his writing, which is most noticeable in OB, but is also present in WoR and Warbreaker. I don't remember his other books well enough to comment. Anyway, is lack of grief over or thoughts about Jasnah's death in Dalinar's and Adolin's PoVs in WoR "evidence" that they never cared about her? Or that their relationship was very distant? OB demonstrates not. In fact, it is revealed that Dalinar had a closer connection to his niece than I previously expected, that she helped raise and educate Adolin. There are other examples of this, such as Dalinar and Navani being happy as punch mere weeks after Elhokar's death. So, lack of expected reactions/thoughts in a PoV can't be taken as proof of some deeper meaning. Or Sanderson can take the relatively less trodden path of marriage not being culmination of a romantic relationship, but the beginning of a long and challenging struggle towards true partnership/love. I think that concentrating on 3 main characters with everybody else having significantly smaller roles already makes the narrative somewhat claustrophobic and that having an involved romance between 2 of those will suck air out of everything else even more. It was OK to have such a narrow focus while were being introduced to a new, inventive and intriguing setting - everything that any PoV saw was fresh and interesting. But that is mostly gone now and to be able to keep up with the widening scope of the story we need to see the narrative from more angles and interact with more characters directly or indirectly. I also think that Shallan's brothers, rather than any love interest, would be crucial to her finally fully accepting the Truth about her mother and re-integrating. She will have to come clean to them and help them deal with it /possibly have to accept that some of them will be unable to forgive her, yet still learn to forgive herself. Radiant was to fix perceived shortcomings, and she is the more rudimentary mask. Veil is more complete and more geared towards escapism than anything else. And absolutely, creation of these personas didn't make her _less_ capable of doing things as Shallan, as you often claim in other posts. She didn't turn into some prim and proper maiden after their creation, which she never was in the first place, and certainly not in her interactions with Adolin. She didn't become less brave - and Adolin has seen her being brave as Shallan too - both with Re-Shepir and when they were thrown into Shadesmar and she led them from the Oathgate platform to safety. Ah, no. Veil is a role, a mask that became more real than she should have been because of Shallan's magic. She is based on Shallan in some ways, but has been purposefully created to be different in others, to distinguish her from Shallan and to provide escape from her past. Some of Shallan's traits are exxaggerated almost to the point of caricature in Veil, while others are completely suppressed, even though they are integral to the full personality. Like Shallan's artistic talent - it is at the core of who Shallan is, how she sees the world and probably is what attracted Pattern to her in the first place and enlarged her soul enough to enable the bond before all the traumatic stuff happened. But it was also her main means of coping with her past, so it had to be excised from Veil, as it became too connected with the family tragedy in Shallan's mind. And fluctuating artistic ability provides a compelling argument that Veil is more real than you'd like to admit and that she is, indeed, different from Shallan. Oh, and Kaladin, of course, has no use for art. Hm... But would she even have these feelings if she didn't suppress the knowledge of Kaladin killing Helaran? Yes, it was on a battlefield, with no foul play involved, yet this didn't stop Shallan from instantly hating Amaram when she thought that he was responsible. No matter what gloomy scottish ballads would claim, if somebody kills a brother you love, it would be a deal-breaker for most people. And, to be honest, I kind of wonder why, given her past, Shallan was even attracted to a broody, passionate dude, who occasionally uses anger as a crutch. Yes, yes, he is a great guy, but this similarity to her father should still have been a reflexive turn-off. Is this why her attraction surfaces when she is looking for escape from her past? Is this why it got shifted onto Veil persona, where it immediately grew much more overt?

People make long-range plans all the time without being able to see the future and Cultivation could have helped with that part anyway. Going mad didn't preclude having a longe-range plan either . Anyway, my other theory is that Honor's ravings were a con carried out by Ishar. The interesting thing is that Ishar and Nale weren't worried about the Radiants destroying the world through their surges without Honor to keep them in check, but about a small chance of them destroying some mysterious "measures we took", thus weakening the Oathpact further and somehow causing a Desolation. Now, this is very different from Honor's alleged ravings and the Recreance was very handy for Ishar's goals. A fortituious coincidence or did he make it happen? Was dying Honor unable to talk to the Radiants anymore, perhaps, and did Ishar somehow impersonate him? His current god-king antics could be a hint. Or was he able to manipulate Honor through their connection? In any case, Ishar very likely knew how the things truly went down on Ashyn and he wasn't worried about Radiants potentially destroying Roshar. Yes, he is crazy now, but was he really that crazy back at the time of the Recreance, when he recruited Nale to prevent resurgence of the Orders? And even in "Honor's ravings", the Dawnshards appeared to be crucial to the destruction of Ashyn and they are, according to one of Dalinar's visions, lost. Of course, in the very same vision Honor also thought that they would have given humanity a better chance against Odium - which suggests what happened on Ashyn, doesn't it? A battle with Odium - that's when there is a real danger of harming the world, yet giving in would be even worse...

I do think it possible that Honor had a long-range plan and that the Recreance was part of it in some way. Maybe in that it cozened Odium into waiting long enough for humans to build a civilization that would be able to resist him without such an overwhelming reliance on the Heralds and surge-binders as in the past. Maybe in that it gave Cultivation time to introduce a lot of potentially vital subtle changes without Odium noticing. But isn't it really odd, how on one hand Honor was "raving" about the Radiants being doomed to destroy the planet and thereby causing the Recreance... while on the other hand, he was preparing means for the re-founding of the Orders in the future? I mean, wouldn't the danger of destroying the world be far greater with both the Fused and the Radiants using surges in apocalyptic battles, than with Radiants alone, mostly using their powers for innocuous and productive things? I have difficulty to imagine how some of the Radiant powers even could be used for world-destroying purposes. Truthwatchers and Edgedancers, for instance, seem completely "safe" from that perspective to me. And then, there is the fact that Honor's Cognitive Shadow is like no other that we have seen so far, in that it doesn't seem to be an investiture-preserved personality, but a collection of visions and commands. Could it be that other parts of Honor's and/or Tanavast's consciousness are hidden elsewhere? In the Sibling, perhaps? Could the "old Nohadon" of Dalinar's extra-curricular dream have been Tanavast's cognitive shadow in the more usual sense? Isn't there a WoB that numbers of Nahel spren increased after Honor's death? I seem to remember something along these lines. He also says that he "once thought" that he could leave them behind, so it is not at all laughable to imagine that he didn't take the threat of Honor's splinters seriously... until he saw how they could be used to effectively oppose him, still.

I loved Eshonai, particularly after her OB prologue and her having been so unceremoniously disposed off made me sad. I like Venli and I am very interested in what her PoVs have and hopefully will be showing us. I do feel that Dalinar, Venli and Szeth all being repentant mass-murderers is a bit of an overkill and cheapens the notion of redemption. But of the 2 of them who aren't main characters, Szeth is the bigger problem for me in that respect. Rlain is, unfortunately, a bit of a blank slateso far, though his circumstances are full of potential for great development. His PoVs also need to feel more different from human ones. Eshonai's and Venli's convey their alienness better, IMHO. I can't wait to see listener culture and history fleshed out more through Eshonai's flashbacks and, hopefully, Rlain's discovery of Thude's group of survivors and perhaps even rescue of remaining stormforms from the Fused body-snatching.

Nope, Kaladin also had to (re-)say the Words when he brought Syl back. Also, there are hints in the epigraphs to WoR from thee in-universe WoR book that most of the ex-Radiants were slaughtered shortly after the Recreance. The point was to discourage the spren from ever bonding in the future - and it worked out pretty well in that regard. I also think it likely that the massacred spren agreed with their partners that their deaths were worth preventing the destruction of the world. Now, I do think that both the old Radiants and their spren were misled in some way, because it is all but impossible that humans on Ashyn could have used the surges in the same way that the Radiants do, not to mention that they couldn't have had oath-limited Nahel bonds. Oh, and we have quotes both by Taln and by the Stormfather that suggest that surge-binding was completely unknown on Roshar before the creation of the Honorblades - so something is definitely rotten both about Eilia Stele and about Honor's senile rantings. But when your god tells you that you are going to destroy the world, few would have the inner strength to doubt and, particularly among the Radiants, few would be selfish enough to risk it. As I have said in my previous post, I do think that some Radiants did leave Rosharan system instead, but they wouldn't have been too numerous. That would depend on whether it is easier or harder to take deadeyes out of Roshar's/Rosharan system's Shadesmar than the living Nahel spren, I imagine. I don't remember any rumors/legends about such weapons in the other Cosmere books, though. And, of course, dead shardblades would be useless for humans living mainly in the Cognitive Realm

Right, and I think that the Ghostbloods are part of that plan, or, at least, have collected a splinter of Ambition at some point, just like they are currently trying to get a hold of Sja-Anat. Mraize's utterings, such as: "The old fool sows chaos, but does not reach for the power offered by opportunity." or " “Morality is an axis that doesn't interest us,” Mraize said calmly. “Only loyalty and power are relevant" seem to very much agree with Ambition's intent. My current theory re: the end of the Stormlight Archive is that Odium will escape Rosharan system... but in severely weakened/mortally wounded condition and that another Shard will pick up it's power and combine their Shards and Intents + one or 2 more to form the ultimate Cosmere big bad. This could be reformed Ambition, or it could be that as yet unknown Shard will incorporate both (splinters of?) Ambition and Odium.

We know that it is not the case as _all_ the Nahel spren that we have seen so far tell us the same tale - that all the "adult" spren among their peoples were killed by the Recreance - which means that they aren't around their fellows. I do think that some of the ancient Radiants - particularly those of the Orders of Elsecallers, Willshapers, Truthwatchers and Lightweavers may have left the Rosharan system via worldhopping instead of breaking their oaths and either founded or joined cosmere spoiler: In fact, the interlude of Puuli the Natanatan lightkeeper makes me wonder if some of their descendants might return to Roshar when they hear about the Desolation, bringing these ancient spren back. We know from Azure that using Honor's Perpendicularity for transfer into physical realm is supposed to be dangerous - well, it dumps a traveller into the eye of a highstorm, so no wonder. But I suspect that it is safer at the Origin and that they have a kind of worldhopper way-station there, complete with ships that can take them to the mainland*. Another possibility that occurs to me is that maybe the Radiant spren can be trapped in gems? This may have seemed more merciful to some of the "recreating" Radiants. Or, maybe this is the method for taking them off-world - there is a WoB that that it is possible, but there is a trick to it. As a corollary to this, I have to wonder how the Horneaters can be unaware of foreign travellers occasionally appearing on or coming to their Peaks? We know that Rock has seen Hoid, of course, and considered him a god, but wouldn't less overpowered travellers need to trade for guides and supplies with the natives, as the mountains outside the Peaks themselves are supposed to be harsh and getting up and down them both hard and dangerous?

Some descriptions that I have found for another thread: We know that Adolin has an Edgedancer's blade, IIRC Moash's blade looked similar and also briefly manifested "vines" when summoned, so it probably was one as well. The mysterious shardblade that had been switched for Taln's Honorblade looked "cleaver-like" and Elhokar's was long and thin, with large crossguard and decorated with 10 "fundamental glyphs" on the blade. Pretty good variety, I'd say, but it is not easy to assign some of them to any Orders. I do think that there are shardblade caches around - Nale certainly had dead shards at his disposal, as we know that Helaran Davar was given some. Also, it is possible that squires can use them without hearing screaming. Other Heralds may have also squirrelled some away or even purposefully pulled as many as they could out of circulation and hid them. Ditto Aimians. Possibly the Shin, even. Some groups of Radiants may have broken their Oaths in secluded places and hidden their blades themselves. In any case, I think that Odium's forces are going to come into possession of large numbers of shards - either via Ishar's treason or by some other means. Perhaps some of Odium's spren remaining on Roshar - intelligent Unmade or lesser spren that managed to hide away after the Last Desolation, have kept track of shards caches and now the greatest advantage that the Radiants had over the Fused is about to be severely reduced.

But wouldn't the Recreance have happened during the time when Honor was frantically re-shaping the Stormfather into his cognitive shadow? IMHO, the Stormfather couldn't have been bonded during that process. And wouldn't the betrayal and death of his "firstborn" honorspren have been wound enough? The thing with Melishi, the imprisonment of Bo-Ado-Mishram and withdrawal of the Sibling is that we don't know the chronology of all these events. I still think that the Sibling could have been Melishi's spren, who was badly hurt in the process/ as a result of BAM's imprisonment.

What also looks like a loose end to me is how calmly and easily everybody gave up Alethkar for lost, and that Kholins weren't blamed for taking most of the armies to the Shattered Plains and keeping them there for 6 years, which could be construed as the cause for the fall of the homeland. You'd think that as soon as the parshmen transformed and started to move towards Alethkar, everybody would have screamed blue murder and the recalcitrant highprinces, who remained at the camps, would have tried to do something about it. And then, when the spanreeds started to go silent, etc., why weren't there constant demands on the Elhokar/Dalinar to do something? Don't most of the people in Urithiru and on the Shattered plains, beginning with the highprinces and highlords, have families back in Alethkar? Property? Even once it became clear that holding/recovering northern and central Alethkar was impractical, people being people, I'd still expect those who had interests there to do everything in their power to still try to bring it about (uselessly, of course). But it is far less clear that defending southern Alethkar would be similarly futile, yet it appears to have been given up for lost in the last Kaladin's chapter as well. Nobody is even trying to organize an orderly evacuation or to save resources and transport them to the Shattered Plains. I do suspect that at least some of this will come into play in the next book, but it felt very contrived throughout OB that it was, for the most part, glossed over. Corollary to this - I really love that Sanderson has families play such a big role in SA. It is only realistic and a very refreshing change from the usual orphan stereotypes. However, he needs to be consistent about it. Even though Bridge 4 was a group of very much down on their luck individuals, Kaladin, Rock and Lopen can't be the only members who had families that they'd have a good reason to worry about when/if their homeland fell to the Fused. The same applies to the other soldiers, scribes, etc. Yes, some would have brought their families to the Shattered Plains, but most wouldn't have, as it was a long and somewhat dangerous trek, what with all the bandits in the Frostlands, etc., and due to the very real risk of them being stranded in the camps, far from everything they knew, without a source of income and without the help of extended family if their father/brother etc. died in the fighting. Also, with most of the Highprinces being middle-aged men who were forced to abandon their holdings for years, they'd have left their adult sons in charge. Much safer than some cousin who might look to usurp your line. And yes, most of them should have several children, " a heir and a spare" and a daughter or 2 to scribe sensitive stuff and to build alliances with, grandchildren, etc. Ruthar shouldn't have been the only one among them worrying about his son back home.

No, they wouldn't use assassins - that is, they wouldn't hire them. But, as seen with young Shallan, if their target had no criminal past, the Skybreakers _would_ try to convince other people to kill a nascent surge-binder instead. Or, if my suspicion that the "eliminated" proto-Radiant in Amaram's army was Tien is correct, would manoeuvre such a person into a situation where they were likely to get killed. Thus it is entirely possible that Jasnah was manipulated into conflict with the Ghostbloods (or vice versa) in the hopes that they would kill her. After all, even if the "brokenness" requirement for the Nahel bond exists (which is a matter of some debate), it wouldn't necessarily, or even mostly stem from a crime that the Skybreakers could conveniently spin into a death warrant. Many/most of their targets likely were law-abiding citizens and some would have been too highly placed to be accountable to the law (like Jasnah).

Which was my point - that hopes that Nale's defection won't be so bad because he might maintain singer laws by aligning himself with the listeners or the rebellious new singers under Venli's new leadership, are futile because he currently thinks that the Dawnsingers, aka the Fused are the true masters of Roshar. There is still a small chance that something might change his state of mind, maybe connected with the Heralds getting put out of comission by Jezrien's true death - if they are knocked out for a while and something happens in the interim or if it somehow improves their mental condition, perhaps? . But it is not very likely.

So, here is what Oathbringer looks like: "The silvery Blade curved at the end almost like a fishhook. The weapon was even wider than most Shardblades, and near the hilt it rippled in wave-like patterns." I would say that it is inconclusive, but it is a warrior's sword, so I like the idea that it belonged to a Stoneward. Dalinar has a connection to Stonewards, both through his belonging to the devotary of Talenelelat and his personality traits, such as phenomenal tenacity, resourcefulness, etc. I also have a somewhat crackpottish theory that Dalinar will give Oathbringer to Taln and the broken shardblade and the broken Herald will somehow heal together. OTOH, here is Eshonai's: "A Shardblade—shaped like frozen flames—rose from the ground beside her, rammed into the stone floor." Definitely a Dustbringer blade. and Gavilar's ditto: "Gavilar's Shardblade, Firestorm, was six feet long with a design along the blade that resembled burning flames that "almost seemed to glow."

I think that Jasnah's survival was definitely due to her station, as according to the Ghostblood missive Nale has some unknown way of learning about and tracking general locations of nascent Radiants. His actions in Yeddaw support this theory - when he came, he knew that there was a surge-binder there, but not who. He may also be able to sense investiture when he is face to face with somebody. Jasnah's alleged acquisition of a mysterious soulcaster would have been an immediate red flag to him and she also had repeated incidents with her shadow pointing the wrong way, some of them in public, prior to her first meeting with Ivory in Shadesmar, which is shown in WoR prologue. In fact, when they ran into each other during the fateful feast, Nale reacted thusly: "The Azish man, the one dressed in black and silver, stopped and looked her up and down. He frowned." And then he kept standing there and staring at her until Kalak dragged him off. I bet that he knew then and there that Jasnah was becoming a surge-binder, but, thankfully, couldn't touch her due to his psychosis. Directly, at least. Indirectly - well, Jasnah survived a lot of assassination attempts and who knows how her vendetta with the Ghostbloods came about. As to the other Kholin surge-binders and Kaladin, once he came under their protection - it could have played a role. We don't know how long they spent in the initial stages of bonding - this could differ a lot on individual basis. Not to mention that we don't know at what point that would have put them on Nale's radar. I guess we'll see if any other non-Skybreaker Radiant who has been around as long as Jasnah or, at least, longer than Our Heroes appears. I mean, Shallan has had a bond as long as or even a little longer than Jasnah, technically, but she is a special case as it was supressed almost to the point of breaking after her mother's death, which luckily got her off the radar. Also, her father made her wear an aluminium necklace, which may have helped, too.

But there aren't any normal lighteyes with this (creepy) color, so I can only assume that Edgedancer descent/shardblade produces very pale grey eyes like Mr T's. And, presumably, results in orange-colored lighteyes, which seem to be pretty rare. IIRC, only Brightness Kalami has them and Vivenna mimics them, in all 3 books. I know this, I just wonder when the permanent change happens. Moash's eyes turned light tan within a couple weeks, IIRC, but as soon as he unbonded the blade, his previous eye-color was restored. So, would the change have become permanent with time or would it only have affected any children conceived while he was bonded to the shardblade? Right, I think that the Heralds aren't subject to normal rules. Taln appeared at Kholinar with his Honorblade summoned, but his eyes remained dark. And nobody ever notices Nale's eye-color changing no matter which of his 2 blades he summons or when he surge-binds, so presumably it doesn't. Yet, summoning Jezrien's Honorblade turned Szeth's naturally dark-green eyes saphire blue.

I would argue that he is already a far more interesting, consistent and multi-faceted character than Amaram ever was. And, if nothing else, he'll provide us with at least one truly great duel in which he'll demonstrate some real shardblade dual-wielding and surge mastery. I still have a faint hope that something will deflect him from his current Odium-oriented trajectory, but it is pretty unlikely. I can't help but wonder - if Szeth had died for good at the end of WoR as originally intended, would Nale have been our "present-day" PoV for Szeth-flashback book? Sigh.

Honestly, that battalion command never made a lot of sense, as Kal was always occupied with other things, they didn't have any kind of proper command structure or adminstrative staff, Teft did some things with the other bridgemen, but was mostly Kal's second with Bridge 4, Sigzil was his "clerk" also only for that, etc. I wonder who was managing the duty schedules and such of the other bridges - probably Dalinar's officers. Anyway, as Kaladin himself admits in his Hearthstone chapters all of this is behind him now, he is the leader of the new Order of Windrunners. But one loose end that really surprised me was that he never confessed his own part in the plot to murder Elhokar and that nobody wondered what happened to a shiny new Kholin shardbearer (Moash) whom Kal had bestowed the newly won shards on. I really thought that Kaladin coming clean about all of it would be an important moment of growth, both for him and for Elhokar (RIP). And also, it is kinda odd that Kaladin promised to return to Hearthstone and take his family to safety, spoke about it with Dalinar... and then nothing happened? When he was flying places at the end of OB, I thought that he was flying to get his family, which managed to escape to Jah Keved, but it was to fetch his and Shallan's men and little Gavinor instead. That was nice, but as a known family of a Radiant, his parents and brother aren't safe under occupation!

Hm... interesting WoB. So, does this mean that it takes several generations of Radiants in a family to turn the descendants eyes permanently light? One of the epigraphs in WoR does say that a lot of Radiants used to settle in Alethela even while Uritiru was still fully functional. And how does it work with the bearers of the dead shardblades? In WoB Kaladin noticed that Moash's eyes were lightening and turning "tan", but it seems that the change didn't stick after he gave up his shardblade? At least, nobody mentioned it, including his old caravaneer acquaintance. Also - an interesting detail that I have noticed re-reading the 3 books, but there are tons of green-eyed lighteyes in the text. In fact, they seem to be even more common than the blue-eyed ones, which suggests that the Truthwatchers were a pretty large order. Of course, it turns out that garnets can be pretty much any color between yellow and violet, so some of them might be descended from the Lightweavers as well. But still, I subconciously expected the Truthwatchers to be one of the smaller Orders, which doesn't seem to have been the case. By contrast, there are really few grey-eyed lighteyes, which seems to hint that Edgedancers and Skybreakers weren't very numerous...

Another question I have: How do Listener lifespans compare to human ones? Are they significantly longer/shorter? And corollary to this: Where are the Listener children? We saw none in Narak during Eshonai's PoVs in WoR, but knowing that there were over 100K Listeners at the start of the war, surely there should have been thousands?

You are naturally free to disagree, but would you mind first satisfying my curiosity - what things are these, that would be outside the scope of powers of a Herald who is also a Radiant and has a spren at his beck and call? As far as we have seen the Heralds can innately speak all Rosharan languages perfectly, which likely also extends to "speaking to the rythms". Not to mention that Nale's ability to be precisely were and when he needed to be to revive Szeth already hints at Hoid-like non-Heraldic powers or, perhaps, Odium's future-sight. As well as his alleged ability (in Ghostbloods communication to Shallan) to track down people in the very early stages of attracting a Nahel spren and bonding them to the highspren instead.

Nale was desperately trying to prevent a Desolation by killing people who, in his opinion, had a small chance to inadverently cause one, - Gavilar purposefully wanted to _start_ a Desolation , which, according to the Ghostbloods, was known to the Skybreakers. Isn't it quite a convenient "coincidence" that Nale was there when Gavilar was about to take an important step towards his goal, but was assassinated instead? That he had a perfect instrument for spying on the king in the form of his bonded spren? That he had the knowledge of the past to anticipate the listeners horror when they learned the true reasons for that very favorable alliance with the Alethi? Not to mention, the whole unlikely chain of events that led to the listeners coming into possession of Szeth and knowledge of his secret* _just_ before they learned about the king's intentions? And how they took it as a sign to act? We already have an example of how Skybreakers operate when they have to take out somebody when they can't get appropriate warrants for their execution with what happened to Shallan. A Skybreaker acolyte convinced her own mother to murder her, keeping his own hands technically clean. That's exactly what Nale did re: Gavilar, only he manipulated the events in a more circumspect way. But then, he must have a lot of practice, as not all of his targets would have had a criminal past. *WoR conversation between the 2 Heralds in my previous post proves that he knew all about it too.

In WoR prologue, Nale's companion, who is almost certainly Kalak says this: Words echoed in the hallway, coming from up ahead. "I'm worried about Ash." "You're worried about everything." Jasnah hesitated in the hallway. "She's getting worse," the voice continued. "We weren't supposed to get worse. Am I getting worse? I think I feel worse." "Shut up." "I don't like this. What we've done was wrong. That creature carries my lord's own Blade. We shouldn't have let him keep it. He--" Which suggests that both Heralds had something to do with Gavilar's murder and particularly Szeth's role in it. Nale also somehow knew that the feast was over - due to Szeth starting on his killing spree, despite being in the bowels of the palace, far from the feast hall. Liss the assassin and Szeth's former owner also somehow knew that something was going to happen, whith her sly hints of "on a night like this" and entirely too fortuitious selling of Szeth , etc. In OB prologue we have learned that the listeners were guided into buying Szeth by "a voice speaking to the rythms" and the same voice helped them _press_ Szeth for answers until he admitted to having a Honorblade. Then, when Eshonai reported the awful truth of Gavilar's intentions to the elders, they took having Szeth at their disposal as the sign of what needed to be done to forestall the king. It is easy to see that the poor listeners have been manipulated into assassination by somebody who knew about and disapproved of Gavilar's goals, but couldn't take direct action against him - which fits Nale, who needed proper paperwork to kill his targets, which would have been impossible in this case. Ghostblood information that Shallan received in OB also claimed that Nale was opposed to Gavilar and wished his death. Now, after OB came out many people jumped to the conclusion that Ulim the Envoy spren was the "voice", but Venli specifically notes in her PoV that Ulim speaks like a human*. And now we know that Nale has a spren of his own that could have easily been the "voice" instead. The Herald of Justice had motive, means and opportunity and Kalak's dialog confirms that they have done something "wrong" relating to Szeth. It is pretty clear, IMHO that Nale (and Kalak?) was the one who set the assassination up by indirect means. * P.S. Also, Venli went along with the Elder Klade on slave-buying expedition where they ended up with Szeth due to the mysterious voice's "guidance", and she also interacted with Ulim a lot later, but she never suggests in her PoV that they were the same. In fact, she was _against_ Gavilar's murder, as she was all for him succeeding.