Sedside

I don't say Danlan is the only argument for the Diagram. It's just like a cherry on top of the pie, actually. The main reasons are in the post. And I also forgot to mention Helaran's and Davar's overall involvement with Jah Keved politics on the side of Valam, who ended up as King. I mentioned other Blade versions than the dead one just for the sake of considering all of the options. I think it was dead too.

You talk about it the way like the only thing Kaladin lacks is a willing woman, so anyone can offer him his daughter and there we go. He is one of the most eligible bachelors on Roshar, come on. Knight Radiant, Shardbearer, landowner, Blackthorn listens to him an trusts him, he is in command of a thousand men and so on. And just overall awesome. I don't think, finding a woman is the problem. I also don't think Kaladin will marry for political reasons. He values his freedom too highly to bond with a woman he has no feelings for. He is quite stubborn, and I think he will rather stay alone. Also, pure political marriage is boring plot-wise. How will it serve Kaladin character progression?

So we know, that after Shallan read Mraize’s letter, Pattern said: “Secrets. There are lies in this letter.” I wanted to figure out what exactly could those lies be. I assume those are “meaningful” lies, not incorrect wording or something like that, but a deliberate attempt to tell Shallan something wrong, that can lead her the wrong way. I also assume that Pattern isn’t an ultimate detector of lies just because they are lies. He just sees patterns in all things, so he sees some misconnections and illogical statements, that’s why he says there are lies in the letter. I also don’t think that “lies” are similar to “hiding something”. So my assumption is that the lies in this letter are major and intentional. So, here is the whole letter (spoilered for length). TLDR: Sons on Honor want to bring Desolations and Heralds back. That’s obviously the truth, as stated in text and by WoBs. Skybreakers want to prevent the Desolations. That’s obviously the truth too. Heralds cannot be viewed as allies. There was an opinion somewhere on this forum, that this statement might be lies, but I disagree. All Heralds have different goals and have different states of mind - whos ally can Jezrien be, for example (he was alive when the letter was written)? Ash doesn’t seem to care too. Nale is an enemy to team Honor, others are playing their own games too. So, I think this thesis is also the truth. Shallan’s mother was involved with Skybreakers. This could be the lie, but I don’t think it is. It looks logical and makes sense. But if we imagine it was a lie - why mention it in the first place? What goal is he accomplishing by telling this lie to Shallan? I struggle to come up with an idea. Helaran was involved with Skybreakers. And this is the one I think is the lie. I will explain my PoV below. This Skybreakers reveal makes absolutely no sense to me. There are a lot contradictions to the facts we know so far. Let’s analyze this reveal from a logical standpoint. I will list all the details or statements, that I find doubtful or weird, provide them all with all possible explanations I can see, and try to disprove them: 1. Helaran’s Shardblade. a). The Shardblade is alive. i) The Shardblade is Helaran’s spren. If his Shardblade comes from his spren, then he must be at least 3rd level Skybreaker (which actually already is a lie, because the letter says he wanted to prove himself worthy of a spren bond), and in this case a 3rd level Skybreaker managed to get killed with a single face blow of a common spear, not using a single surge before his death. Did he forget to take infused spheres with him? ii). The Shardblade is other Radiant’s spren. If some other Radiant had borrowed Helaran his Shardblade, why didn’t they summon that Shardblade back after Helaran’s death? b). The Shardblade is dead. If Helaran isn’t bonded to a spren, as the letter itself states, then his Shardblade must be dead. This is the most likely case, if Skybreakers reveal is true. But it still doesn’t make sense to me. Why would Knights Radiant order keep a dead Shardblade? Why give it to a potential member of the order or whomever else? They have a lot of members of 3+ level wielding living Blades that can do such kind of job much more effectively. Why would Skybreakers need a Shardbearer wielding specifically dead Blade for any kind of job? The only possible reason for that could be if they needed to kill someone, who hasn’t committed any crimes, so this action wouldn’t damage their bonds. But wouldn’t it? If they don’t do it themselves but order someone else to do it, are their spren OK with that? All right, if giving an order to kill an innocent doesn’t damage the bond, why don’t they exploit their 3rd Oath, so that several 3rd level Skybreakers swear to follow Nale’s judgement, like Szeth sworn to follow Dalinar, and everyone wins? Nale’s bond is fine, as long as he doesn’t take frags for himself, members’ bonds are fine too, as they follow the chosen source of law. There was also an opinion somewhere on this forum, that Nale gave him the Blade to prevent him from bonding a spren. Again, doesn’t make sense. If Nale doesn’t want Helaran to bond a spren, why not just kill him? Well, you would say Helaran didn’t commit any crimes. But what does he do with his Shardblade then? If he never kills innocent people with his Shardblade, then why can’t he be replaced by a 3rd level Skybreaker, that can do absolutely the same more effectively? And if Helaran has ever killed an innocent man with his Blade, then Nale easily can just kill him and take his Blade back. And then give it to the next potential Surgebinder to lure him into the same trap. 2. Nale was impressed by Helaran. And here I want to know why. Because I am not impressed by Helaran yet. I know that Shallan thinks very well of him, but what did he do? I am not going to judge his actions or whatever, I just want to know, how could Helaran impress the Herald of Justice, that he had to recruit him to the Knights Radiant order by “display of great power and Shards”? All right, we don’t know what he did, but we have some of his quotes: He doesn’t speak about justice, he doesn’t listen to Lin’s explanations, he doesn’t seem to be rational and willing to do the right thing from the perspective of law. He speaks about vengeance, he is angry, he laughs, barks, summons his Shardblade and so on. He also says, that there are things, that are more important than his father’s crimes. Could something be more important than a crime to a Skybreaker? I don’t know, how this kind of behavior could have impressed Nale. 3. The timeline. The above quoted scene is from 5.5 years ago, and Helaran already has a Shardblade in it. So he has presumably joined Skybreakers more than 4 years prior to his death. So the conclusions are: i) The man that has impressed Nale himself couldn’t prove being worthy of a spren bond during more than 4 years. ii) That same man was 4 years a Shardbearer. Kaladin was 4 years a spearman. Blade and Plate are much more powerful weapons than a common spear. Still, Helaran died to Kaladin, given the same amount of time for training. Helaran has impressed Nale? 4. The whole point of proving worthy of a spren bond. As I understood from the text, wielding a dead Blade prevents one from bonding a spren. Also, I think that proving yourself worthy of bonding a highspren by killing 20 innocent people just passing by is not a terribly good decision. Well, all right, most of them attacked him, so it could count as self defence, but what did Cenn do? He was only 15, and Helaran trampled him with his horse. And by the way, was his horse also given to him by Skybreakers? 5. Some quotes about his business. It sounds strange to me, that Hoid could have said “doing things he finds very important” about being a member of Knights Radiant. I would read this as “playing his toys” or something like that. It’s just a strange wording, to me. I would say that it’s more likely be worded as “becoming someone” or “having an important mission” or something like that. And also it is strange, that Helaran has eyes, watching Lin. Would he have them, if he was a Skybreaker acolyte? All right, maybe Skybreakers would be interested in Lin’s crimes, but how wouldn’t they then notice Shallan and finish her mother’s job? And if Helaran truly thought Skybreakers’ mission important, wouldn’t he then tried to finish it too? Also, at this point of story Helaran is in Alethkar. Other times they mention his whereabouts they are in Jah Keved - Northgrip and Valath. Considering that Skybreakers’ fortress is in Purelake, it is strange, how far he is always from there. Another quote from Helaran himself: He also says that it’s a “work to do”. So it feels like this is the work that can be finished, not an ongoing process of eliminating Surgebinders and progressing as a KR. And notice also that he uses the pronoun “we”, and says that he will tell Shallan about it someday. Skybreakers don’t seem like a team doing the same job to me, and I also don’t think he would like to tell Shallan, that he is one of the Lost Radiants, killing other potential Lost Radiants to prevent the return of the Desolations. So, that’s my list of questions to Mraize, if you could say so. Well, if Helaran wasn’t a Skybreaker, then who? Either the Ghostbloods or the Diagram member. I personally think the Diagram makes more sense, but the Ghostbloods would be interesting too. I really don’t know, so would be nice if you could provide your opinions on the matter. I will share my thoughts on this. The Diagram Pros: It would perfectly explain the horse and the Shards, also his statements of “we have an important work to do” – it looks very much like how Moash and Graves worded their motives, and also Hoid’s “does things he finds important”, which could be explained as “kid playing revolution”. We also know that Mr T knew about Helaran: (btw, I think it’s not about teaching Shallan surgebinding, but about teaching her use her Shardblade) Another interesting thing to me is that “Patriots” chapter, in which Kaladin meets Graves follows the chapter in which Hoid tells Shallan about Helaran. It was 3.5 years ago, and then: So we have a chapter, that states that Helaran was in Alethkar 3.5 years ago, and in the next chapter Danlan says she was in Kholinar 3 years ago, and she is a member of the Diagram. Cons: It’s still not clear, why Mraize would lie to cover up the Diagram. My assumption is that Mraize’s main bounty is information, and he just doesn’t want to give away a huge chunk of it, when he can give away almost nothing, because Shallan will discover the Skybreakers soon anyway from Szeth/Lift. Also, no clear reason for the Diagram to kill Amaram. The Ghostbloods Pros: Explains why Mraize lies to Shallan about it. Interesting option plot-wise, because it could be that Ghostbloods had sent Helaran to his death on purpose, if they were aware of Kaladin (they were aware of Tien, so we can assume the same about Kaladin). Cons: The assault was quite dumb for the Ghostbloods. Doesn’t explain the horse and the Shards. Lin was a member too, and he ordered Helaran’s assassination. I would like to hear your opinions on the matter, but I regarding the Ghostbloods I would very much appreciate if you tried to avoid spoilers from the other Cosmere books, as I haven't yet read them. I understand, that the Ghostbloods are Cosmere aware guys, but I'm not.

Storms, mate, I've logged in just to upvote your post and say how much I love it. You made my day!

I’m just going to leave the list of my predictions here to have something to quote after I read the 4th book. I don’t care much about realmatics. I appreciate it a lot, as it provides the characters with believable and somewhat predictable environment, which contributes to the overall sense of reality to the story, I’m just not interested in it so much in the first place. What I’m interested in are characters, their progression, and their relationships with each other, as it is something I can use for my own progression as a person. That's also something I feel I can predict, because the laws of psychology should remain the same even in a fantasy book, otherwise it's not worth reading. 1. Shadolin will not survive. Details spoilered for length. 2. Kaladin will marry Jasnah, but the journey will not be simple and straight. Details spoilered for length. 3. Adolin will start his journey to the Dark Side. Details spoilered for length. 4. Shallan will hit the rock bottom to realize that she has to deal with her problems on her own. Details spoilered for length. 5. Szeth will be awesome. As always. I won't provide any details, because it's obvious

According to this logic, no marriage on Roshar can be successful, because males and females share different social roles. Adolin is very enthusiastic about her drawings because he asked her to show them and said they are good? Well, then she can marry almost any man or woman on Roshar, because everyone thinks they are good and also I think a lot of people would ask her to show them. Kaladin and Jasnah did too, so Shalladojasnahdin confirmed? They spend time together chatting because they are storming betrothed. She also has another interests in getting closer to him - she needs to get to Navani in WoR to find Urithiru, she needs to protect her brothers. And despite them spending loads of time together chatting, Adolin still fails to comfort her any other ways than by physical contact - hugging, rubbing her shoulders or whatever. Physical contact calms almost everyone. My colleague rubs my shoulders sometimes just because she likes and wants to do it, and it is very comforting, but it doesn't mean I'm in love with her (I'm a straight woman). Kaladin, however, doesn't have an access to Shallan's body like Adolin does, but still manages to find the right words or smile, when she needs them, as we can see after her failed palace infiltration attempt. They have 3 (three!) dialogues in OB in total. Two of them are good in whole, and the third one started with mutual discussion of spren and Shallan's theories about them (Adolin just skipped her spren drawings in her sketchpad and went straight to her drawings of people and surely himself), and Shallan went excited during that part. Then they went to a pun exchange, which made them both feel better and shown, that that's another thing they have in common - they love wordplay. And only then, yes, they started discussing their mental problems, and that went wrong. But you, people, just take this last part and prefer to ignore everything else, but for Adolin you are ready to even imagine things, just to make him "be good for her". But I agree, he is good for her. She has learn on a negative pattern first. And about "Adolin is downplaying himself. Is it how he is downplaying himself? Or maybe this? Or this? Or this? Nah. He only starts "downplaying himself" when he sees that "storming bridgeboy" has earned Radiance and proved himself a hero multile times, and poor little Adolin didn't get his piece of pie.

All right, let me sum it up for you, comrades. Adolin will be just fine. He will revive Maya and be a KR, his marriage will be happy and shining, his murder of Sadeas will cause no ramifications, his lack of responsibility, inability to hold his temper, and all his previous relationship problems will just magically disappear. This is going to be a very interesting read. And the moral of this tale will be "manage to be born a handsome rich prince, and everything will drop to you on its own; murder everyone you don't like, and as far as you feel no remorse you will be fine". Maybe Adolin will get bored of Shallan and murder her too? She is difficult and confusing to read anyway, and she prevents Adolin from having fun with much more interesting characters like May Aladar.

I think, Adolin will join Odium, he is a perfect candidate for that. I think, he would get punished for Sadeas' murder and, as he doesn't regret what he did, he would be blaming others for this, just like Moash was. "It's not my fault". Later on Odium would contact him and reveal him the truth about his father, so Adolin's journey to the Dark Side would be complete. Not sure, tho, it would all happen in SA4.

Let me disagree with you here. Kaladin's reaction very well correlates with his character, and it also opposes Adolin's treatment of Shallan. Adolin said "I will let him have you". Kaladin said "She made her choice". Adolin treats her as an object, Kaladin treats her as a subject. That's why Kaladin is, as you say, "immediately over". Because he understands, that Shallan has her free will, and he has no power over it. He can't change her desicion, so all he has to do - deal with it. It's absolutely healthy - to treat someone else's will like a weather. If it's raining outside, there's nothing you can do about it, just change your plans and not go for a walk. There is also a role of his overall treatment of himself as someone, who doesn't deserve happiness. When he was in prison, he thought, that Dalinar and B4 hate him and want to get rid of him. When he was going back to Hearthstone he was thinking that his parents won't want to see him, because he failed to protect Tien. So it's absolutely natural, that he thinks he doesn't deserve to be loved by Shallan neither. He absolutely genuinely thinks that he is worse for her. So being sad inside while they are happy would be OOC and unnatural. Why should you be sad, if someone else received something good? Being sad in this situation equals being selfish. It is the same like "oh, he got a girl I wanted, I'm sad", it the same as thinking, that he actually deserved that girl, but storming Adolin was more lucky. If you ever attained any competition, and lost it to someone you admit is much better than you and really deserved victory, you don't feel sad about it. You will feel sad only if you think, that his victory was somehow unfair, and you deserved it more. I also don't believe that he "decided that he never had any feelings". That's not what he thinks, that's what he says to Syl. I think I have to make it my forum signature: "What character says does not equal what character thinks" You have to take into account the context and the previous situations of this character. For example, previous dialogues with Syl about Shallan. Here is the post I wrote about it some time ago, I explain my thoughts about this Kaladin's "revelation" there. I would like to add, that since then I've also noticed, that all three dialogues with Syl contained two reasons from Kaladin's side. The first reason was always the true reason, the second one was always the fake one, which he brought only to end the conversation he didn't want to continue. In the first dialogue he said "she is betrothed" (true reason), then "she is lighteyes" (fake reason). Second dialogue - "I have my bridge crew" (true reason), "she brought her maid to make her hair" (fake reason). Third dialogue - "she made her choice" (true reason), "I didn't love her" (fake reason). There is much more to all those romantic arcs, and I'm 100% convinced it's not over. It won't be a "triangle" anymore, though. But the topic is "what your disappointment was" regarding to what's written to the moment, and not what will happen in the future. So I am indeed disappointed by how Shalladin was swept under the rug. I also was disappointed by all this Shallan's reasoning and especially with "bad taste in men". It's such an insult for Kaladin, I was very angry at her at this point. And I also very much agree with @SSSoto that overall idea of a woman needing a man to be healthy and happy is crem. Especially I don't like, when the same people say "Shallan needed Adolin to be happy" and "Jasnah doesn't need a man, she doesn't want to be dependent".

Well, if the theory of "Dark Adolin" can distract you from your gloomy thoughts about Dalinar's fate and make you feel better, I would gladly tell you my thoughts on it in PM. Otherwise too many other people here can feel bad, and this is also possibly offtopic.

Well, I think he fits perfectly. We are discussing our personal assumptions here, right?

Because Adolin will join the Dark Side and die. This is exactly what I think will happen. No jokes.

Those two are off, but otherwise it's funny, have an upvote, friend!

She is not scared of Adolin, she is scared of her truths. That's why they are thruths. If her thruth was "I love Adolin" I would understand you, but no, her truth is "I killed my mother", and she definitely couldn't face it. She created multiple personas for it. And she married Adolin to stick to that particular one, which doesn't have these issues. Anyway, it's running in circles again. So many of you like to keep telling, how much Brandon likes subverting readers' expectations, but when it comes to Adolin, you read it all at the face value. She said he knows her - then he knows. She said, she controls her state now - then she does. No subvertion. Everything as planned. All right, fine. So be it. I'm still gonna analyze text, search for hints, morale and philosophy in all of this. I'm going to make my own conslusions, taking into account everything I read in three books, not only on the couple of last pages of the last book. I don't buy it, especially not in a 3rd book of 5-book arc. And I am going to be ready, when Brandon subverts the expectations of 90% readers.

See, there is a sequence of how it works: There is something you fear. You face it, feeling terrified. You deal with your fear and adapt. ... PROFIT! You don't fear anymore. The sequence you offer is: There is something you fear. You run from it and wait, until you stop fearing. You face it and you still fear, because why in the Damnation you shouldn't fear, if you didn't face it? I mean, you need practice. You can't sit on the couch and grow muscles, you have to go to the gym and excercise.

Because she needs to face her truths and fears to progress, not to run from them. I think it's like what whole her arc is about. And not only hers.

So stagnate and not face her truths. Yes, fairly straightforward, indeed.

Yeah, kind of. It makes perfect sense, because all your failings are in the past, and you can do nothing with your past, so you have to accept your failings and move on. But you still have to remember about them and not lie to yourself, that you didn't fail. Or it wasn't you. Yes, it was terrible, but there is no point circling around it and blaming yourself endlessly, you still have a life to live and work to do. Oh my, you made my day!

I'm really sorry, that your favourite character will get less words, I understand, how you feel. I'm not so fond of Dalinar, I like him, he is definitely very strong and complicated character with an amazing, soul-ripping arc and a huge value for the story. I just sometimes get bored with his chapters, so I can't say I love him as much as you do. When I was reading SA for the first time, sometimes it seemed to me, that I just read chapters of 4 characters, I'm interested in (Kaladin, Adolin, Shallan, Szeth), and on other characters' chapters I just fall asleep. Then I reread SA and I've found myself much more interested in Renarin, Jasnah and Dalinar, then I was on my first read-through. I even fell in love with Elhokar! My poor Elhokar... Anyway. We can't know the future and the author's plan. We can't even lean on WoBs, as they are subject to change and just little pieces of information, that could be misinterpreted. So what's in our power to do is either try to love all the characters and the story itself, or just brace ourselves and trust the author. Or drop the series... I truly believe, that Sanderson won't just waste such an amazing character, as Dalinar, as you imply. I don't think any artist would ever want to waste a masterpiece.

Yeah, I would definitely like to learn more about Malata. She is so mysterious and at the same time disgusting, I'm intrigued

Prior to speaking the Truth, Shallan was hiding from the fact he killed her mother. Every time she comes near it she either stops in place and stares sightlessly (in flashbacks) or stuffs it to the back of her mind or just forgets it. But after she spoke the Ideal: So she found a loophole with multiple personas. Before she spoke the Ideal her coping mechanism was "I didn't do it". After she spoke it it turned into "it wasn't me".

I'd give Jasnah the Internet.

And to me - I loved the beginning of this romantic arc. I think of it as well posted problematic, if we take it in WoR, and very well written dialogues on the both sides of the triangle. In OB, to me, Shallan's motivation was quite fabricated, or at least not well explained. It seemed like "all right, for the story Shallan has to marry Adolin, so I will make her continue extorting the relationships with Adolin, and omit any possible interaction with Kaladin until they both are in their worst mental states, so then I will make them have one single dialogue, which will go poorly only at its end, that Shallan will use this dialogue as an excuse to marry". That's how I see it.

All right, then I'll add Helaran issue and Sadeas murder to the table. Both things were shoved under the carpet or to the back of someone's mind and never actually addressed. I was also disappointed by Shallan marrying the wrong guy, but all those three things I believe are to change in the future books.

Isn't it too much - two Death Rattles for the one event?