CognitiveShadow

Ooooh what if he was bonded to the Wind previously? I'm clearly shooting from the hip and grasping at straws to find ways to make my theory work lol but hey it's techinically possible I believe

So you're saying theres a chance! If he was a bondsmith as some suspect and as Brandon has repeatedly RAFO'd, I'd think it's possible for him to have survived for a very long time, no? He could have been the bondsmith bonded to the Stormfather, and perhaps they conspired together to take over Honor's shard but eventually that resulted in failure and the 'death' of Honor.

Dropping in another comment here to add the thought that perhaps the Nohadon and Tanavast swap happened right at the time when Honor turns against the Singers. It would certainly make sense from a personality perspective and would explain why Nohadon/SF feel extra guilty about the whole thing. IF they conspired to take Honor's shard, it would make sense for it to have happened right when everyone says Honor started acting weird. Of course, this also puts a bit of a wrench into the whole "they saw Honor slipping and decided to step in and take over for the good of Roshar" aspect of the theory. I'm just using this thread to add more WoB's that I feel give strength to the theory

I think the timing is pretty flexible. How do we know Tanavast was still alive at the recreance? Was it perhaps Nohadon instead of Tanavast? That's another potential explanation for Honor's fixation with oaths changing. Maybe Nohadon reacted differently to the Shard's intent than Tanavast did.... What if - their swap happens right at the point that Honor starts acting differently. Is it possible that Nohadon ascended to Honor right at the time that Honor turned against the Singers? And maybe that's why! But they could have tried to keep it under wraps. Plus, most of what we know about Tanavast is told to us from the Stormfather, who we also know has his own agenda and has been telling lies. I also have a more in depth post about this theory here:

I suspect this is partially a result of Cultivation's boon/curse that she gave to Taravangian as a mortal. I don't think it still impacts him directly, but I do think it played a part in influencing him and preparing him for what it would be like to take up Odium - the clash of logic and emotions in extremes, training one to take control of their mind even when overwhelmed with passion and strong feelings. I think it's why ascending to Odium is a difficult task for anyone.

I've been starting to think that Nohadon and Tanavast actually swapped places at some point before Honor finally died. I believe the Cognitive Shadow attached to the Stormfather is actually Nohadon, and not Tanavast, hence the interesting Nohadon vision that Dalinar has. It sounds like Honor's power tends to reject people who want it. It's certainly possible that Tanavast started to be at odds with his power, which caused him to start to lose control of it a little bit, and we know that he became obsessed with oaths at the tail end, even to the point of caring more for the oath than for the intent or reason behind it. Maybe that obsession was tied to him trying to realign himself with the power and take back control? But what if Nohadon, in stepping down from his kingdom and rejecting his earthly power, became a prime candidate as someone who could take control of the shard, so then Tanavast did what some would call weak but stepping down from his own shard and passing it on to someone else?

But then he is also an accomplice to murder, guilty of treason, and unlikely to be trusted by Dalinar and others for a long time. He would be known as little different from Moash, even if he had tried to change his mind at the end but wasn't fast enough. I guess the thing I have a hard time with is that timing and the fact that it was out of his control. At any point there Elhokar could have been murdered with Kaladin's assistance and support without him knowing. But he just gets lucky that Elhokar is still alive when he goes up to check. But regardless, he had to try to save Elhokar before he got murdered - if he just went up there with the intent to save the king and undo the damage he had done, maaaaybe there's a chance his intent was enough to bring back the bond with Syl... but I lean towards Elhokar's death solidifying the death of their bond - it would mean broken oaths that can't be unbroken, which led to Kaladin being responsible for the death of the man he was supposed to be protecting.

Well, let's at least tell Dalinar and Navani what Kaladin let happen and let them decide how they feel about it then. I think Kaladin would at least be guilty of treason and a full on accomplice to murder in my mind. Plus, Kaladin blamed Dalinar, Amaram, Roshone, Elhokar, etc. for their decisions that led to Tien's death... by that same metric he is equally responsible for Elhokar's eventual death at Moash's hands as well. I still maintain that (regardless of the morality in question) the potential consequences of Kaladin's actions were worse than the consequences of Adolin's actions. Adolin's actions had a mostly positive impact, but there may be some difficulty ahead with grumbling and complaining people down the road if the truth comes out. Whereas if Kaladin had been just a couple minutes late, he would not be a radiant and Dalinar would have been killed by Szeth during the first Everstorm. Would any more Honorspren have seriously considered seeking out bonds if they heard that the Ancient daughter had been killed so quickly too? The more I think on this specific instance the more 'lucky' it all turned out to be for everyone involved. Those couple of minutes could have meant the end of it all. No Dalinar to suggest a contest of champions or make a binding agreement with Odium. No hope for any of our main characters, really.

From today's chapters - epigraph about the strength of stepping down and walking away from a conflict... applicable?

I figure coincidences happen all the time in real life, and even more so in the cosmere due to fortune shenanigans, so I’m ok with it

Brandon has said he did not plan for Adolin to kill Sadeas, but instead that Adolin (the character) demanded it. And that’s why it happened. Brandon tries to feel the characters as he writes and let them make their own decisions, and this was one of those instances. Here are some more WoBs on the situation too

1. No one is saying it’s impossible for her to be pregnant. 2. Only “evidence” to this point is Sja-anat saying she wants a safe world for her children, and then adds Shallan’s kids in an attempt to show they are on the same side. Not nearly enough evidence for people to be as certain as they are about this 3. To strengthen the argument, people have added that it happened right after shower sec scene. Some of us have tried to show how the shower sex scene makes no sense because it’s way too soon. I get people want Shallan to have a kid but this was just a wild reach, and so quickly too for just one line that I personally think is being way overblown

I really like that way of looking at it, would make a lot of sense! I'm getting progressively more excited about this idea so I hope someone comes along and pokes some holes in it or else I'll be convinced this is how things are going to go lol

Great points! I wonder if Honor (whether it was T-Honor or N-Honor) set that power aside in the spiritual realm with specific requirements that have to be met in order for someone to take it? Sort of a Sorcerer's Stone situation - only someone who wants it for the right reasons or (from the preview chapters) doesn't want it at all can actually take it up? Sounds like something Kaladin might do..... "Storms, I guess if I have to take it to save other people then I will" THESE WORDS ARE ACCEPTED and BOOM Kaladin becomes Honor? Some relevant quotes from chapters 21/22 with my own bolding/emphasis added:

I've been doing a lot of re-reading in tandem with these new chapter releases, and I have a few thoughts I need to get down into words. Let me know what you think about each of these points or if you have better ideas that would fix the holes in these theories: Story of Roshar's Moons - one moon swaps places with a mortal, that mortal then gets pregnant with a baby from one of the other moons I've seen speculation that perhaps Cultivation swapped with someone temporarily who then got pregnant from Honor, and this could have caused a division between the vessel and the shard because of a potentially broken oath. I could see this being the case, and perhaps this opened the window for Odium to 'kill' Honor There's also room for the question of what happened to the kid - maybe an ancestor of Kaladin's family and that's why Lirin is so weirdly obsessed with Honor (he seriously acts like an honorspren, it's wild)? I know Brandon has said there's no special background or lineage for Kaladin though so unfortunately this is probably not the case The new epigraphs from the in-world Way of Kings include references to abdication. Could the Way of Kings story actually parallel Tanavast's journey? Is it possible (due to his conflict with both his shard's Intent and potentially with Cultivation upon her return) that Tanavast chose to abdicate his position as a Shard and selected someone else to take his place? My latest thought is that he may have given the shard to Nohadon before Odium's attack and that he stepped down to be a normal person for a while We know that Honor acted differently in his last days and was obsessed with the oaths more than usual - could this be due to Nohadon's different interpretation of the Shard's intent or perhaps because he was overpowered by the shard? Did Tanavast then write the Way of Kings under Nohadon's name while he was still alive on the earth? Telling his own story but from the perspective of an earthly monarch instead of a god to make it more relatable to mortals? Brandon answers explicitly that Tanavast is dead on more than one occasion. But he also says that the Stormfather is Honor's Cognitive Shadow in a strange way.... And when asked if Nohadon is dead, Brandon just RAFO's immediately. I propose that Nohadon was the one holding the shard when it was splintered (or perhaps Tanavast passed it to him at some point in the process since splintering is a 'slow burn' death Ultimately, the Cognitive Shadow that is attached to the Stormfather is Nohadon, and not Tanavast This also explains the strange Nohadon vision that Dalinar had - it was Nohadon taking a little more direct action when it was needed to help nudge Dalinar in the right direction To make this even messier and more interesting: What if Nohadon was bonded to the Stormfather as a bondsmith (Brandon has repeatedly RAFO'd whether Nohadon was a bondsmith). And what if he and SF saw that Honor was struggling (maybe due to a conflict with his shard's intent?), so they devised a plan: Somehow trick Tanavast into giving up the power so Nohadon could take over, but this turned out badly and that is what allowed Odium to splinter Honor? Could this be what the Stormfather means when he talks about "our shame"?? Thoughts? Feel free to tear this apart, I know it's a bit out there, but I feel like there could be something to it, even if it is a bit of a mess of semi-contradicting possibilites haha but I could see some combination of these coming together to form the proper storyline perhaps.

Yes. I'm with this very logical and straightforward thought process. Sure, she could be pregnant and I'd be excited about that, but I think people are jumping the gun way too fast here.

Well, here's the WoB I was referencing. Sounds odd to punish yourself though just because you don't like that a character got away with murder. That's quite the confident statement lol I'd be curious to see your list - I like them together but I'm not sold that they are 'perfect' for each other or anything. Honestly Shallan's mind is so fragmented in so many ways that it's hard to imagine her having a stable relationship with anyone. But Kaladin does point out how they are good for each other in the book, at least from his perspective, and points out that he and Shallan together would have likely been a disaster as they'd feed off each other. I tend to agree more with Kaladin's assessment than yours. But I guess my main point on the larger topic is just that I can understand how people in a fantasy world that is set on a cultural understanding of "fight and kill other people to prove yourself to the Almighty and prepare yourself for more wars in the afterlife, the strongest should rule, winning a fight shows you are favored of the almighty, etc." would have the occasional murder. And it is so supremely realistic (even in our world) for the son of a literal king to commit a murder with no witnesses and then to get away with it even after telling the king what they did. Especially when they are at a time of war against an evil god who is trying to subject them all to his rule. One murder of a slimy scumbag who was going to impede their ability to fight against the evil god is a small problem in this situation honestly. I do expect the natural consequences to cause an issue if other people figure out the truth of what happened and blame Dalinar for keeping it a secret, and it has definitely impacted Dalinar and Adolin's relationship. It's possible Brandon changed his mind and this turns out to have major implications in WaT, but I personally kind of doubt it. Besides, if he hadn't killed Sadeas, I'm pretty confident that Jasnah would have had assassins take care of him eventually anyway. She has a known history of paying assassins well and keeping secrets. So many characters in these books are actual murderers and we kind of overlook it because there is a much larger plot and we are just seeing the story. It's not necessarily our place to judge and call for justice. Except for Moash lol

Sure, she can get pregnant and have a baby, but I'm saying Sja-Anat is not trying to make a subtle reference to Shallan currently carrying anything more than Adolin's sperm insider her. So there's definitely no way that there are already soul flames for twin babies if she literally just had sex. Unless she got pregnant from a different time they had sex back in Lasting Integrity. But again - there are zero signs pointing to her actually being pregnant and this one liner from Sja-Anat is being taken wildly out of proportion. People are trying to back it up by highlighting the shower sex scene beforehand but that makes it all make even less sense.

I absolutely love this idea - I can see it being done poorly a million ways, but I think Brandon could pull this off in a really cool way and make it work really well

But would Shallan's kid(s) already have souls that show up in shadesmar just because she had shower sex a day or two before? I would imagine that things don't appear in the cognitive realm until they have been thought up and perceived in some way by the populous, no? Wouldn't it make sense for the souls to show up after the parents know they are going to have a child? In the same way that the beads in shadesmar change based on how they are perceived over time. And how you wouldn't have a bead for a carved wooden horse before the person doing the carving has envisioned what they will be carving, likely not even until after they are well into the process. Until then it would be a bead for a wooden block that has an inkling of an idea of what it might be used for. I propose that there is no way for Sja-Anat to actually know if Shallan is pregnant. And again re-assert that all Sja-Anat cares about in this interaction is creating a world safe for her own children.

Precisely!! Yes, if Kaladin had acted with Honor and had done his duty by reporting Moash and the whole crew to Dalinar right away, a whole lot of damage would have been prevented. Technically he still holds some responsibility for the king's death, simply because he let Moash escape and then Moash killed him later. I really, really want to see a scene where Kaladin owns up to his involvement and tells Navani and Dalinar and Jasnah the whole story. I have to imagine Jasnah and Navani would be pretty upset to know these secrets he's been hiding. And it kinda bothers me that it just isn't something he thinks about. At least Adolin reflects back on his murder of Sadeas every once in a while and has pretty much come to terms with it. Kaladin just ignores what he did and pretends to be the hero who saved the day.... Sounds an awful lot like Amaram if I'm being honest - get directly involved in an assassination attempt, turn around and stop it so you can save the day and be the hero, but never tell anyone about your involvement... Edit to add: Your display name is fantastic lol

From WoBs though we know that Brandon isn't looking to make it a huge deal, just that the implications of the murder haven't totally been fleshed out. But really the only issue is that Adolin admitted to it. If he had never told anyone (or maybe just Shallan), then there wouldn't be any further backlash. No one else knew what had happened. Is the lesson that we shouldn't kill people in dark alleys and we shouldn't support assassination attempts on the king, or is that we shouldn't get caught doing those things? I don't necessarily think there's a lesson invovled so much as a sharing of events and how they happened on this planet with these people. And sometimes people just get away with murder. Kaladin never owned up to what he did, though. Never apologized or admitted his wrongdoings, even though he is supposed to be one of the most honorable characters. He just took praise for saving the day and left it at that. I am just saying that if we hold Adolin to our moral standards, we need to do the same for Kaladin. And I personally have a much bigger problem with what Kaladin did vs what Adolin did. And what about Shallan killing Ialai? Will that have more far-reaching implications? I understand both Ialai and Sadeas's murders could still have consequences in the future if word gets out, but in my opinion both of these murders are too far in the past and much too small of issues to have major consequences in the rest of the book. The only person who seems concerned about Adolin killing Sadeas is Dalinar, and that's only because he has convinced himself that Adolin is a better man than he is and he doesn't want to admit that he might be wrong. The biggest consequence of this murder is the damage it has done to their relationship - and again, that's only because Adolin 'fessed up to it.

Yeah, definitely a good point. It could absolutely just be a coincidence that she experienced a connection with Drehy a couple books back. It just seems so interesting to me that she had both of these experiences and they both involved Drehy specifically. No idea what that means or if it means anything, but it caught me off guard while I was in my re-read since I'd just recently read the new chapters for WaT too.

But they literally live in a world and culture where they believe the strongest survive by power of the Almighty. That's how Dalinar and Gavilar's rule was justified - they won the fights, therefore the Almighty deems them worthy. I think that mentality would have a little bit of an impact on how they view murder, especially when it is not premeditated or planned but when two men come to blows in an alley who have been at odds for years. Especially when the one who died tried to get the other killed previously. I'm ok with Sadeas dying this way. Wit was pretty cool with it too - he was just sad that he missed it. Again I think that for the people in-world it is less of a morality issue and more of a consquences issue. Yes, this gives their enemies some leverage if they find out what really happened, but that's what they are worried about - not whether it was ok for him to do or not. Dalinar might care about that now, but not enough to actually do anything about it. I wouldn't be suprised at all to find out that Dalinar, Gavilar, Sadeas, and others had more than one person they'd killed in a fit of passion that they got away with. Dalinar almost killed people in bar fights all the time apparently - up to the point that people refused to fight him. And that was only when he was fighting for sport or for fun. So if Adolin had tried to do it and had failed, would it be less immoral? Obviously the consquences would be worse because Sadeas would retaliate and make it public knowledge. But those are just the natural consequences based on if people find out or not. If we focus on the morals of it, the intent is key. For Kaladin - he had every intention of letting Elohkar be killed. He, as the top leader of the king's guard, agreed to let a group of people kill the king and agreed that he would turn a blind eye and let it happen. The ONLY reason that it didn't happen is because Kaladin finally admitted he knew it was wrong, and then happened to get there just in time to save the day. Again, the difference of a few minutes gives us either Kaladin the radiant and hero vs Kaladin the injured soldier with a dead spren and severed bond who betrayed the king and let him get assassinated. If Adolin needs to be punished and admit openly to his murder of Sadeas (a known murderer and pretty evil person), then Kaladin also needs to be punished and admit openly the part he played in the attempted assassination of the king. It's doubly wrong because he has been praised and rewarded for saving the king from the assassins that he was directly responsible for. If he is going to get the praise, he should definitely get the blame. I want to know what Navani thinks when she finds out his role there. Dalinar too. Maybe enough time has gone by that they won't do anything about it, especially because he changed his mind, but it's wild that Syl let him get away with not owning up to that. But again, maybe that's just my own moral code and what I've internalized from the way I was raised. In-world this might be similar to the Adolin situation where they aren't as phased by death, assassins, etc. Though they do seem to be pretty anti-treason, so that could be an issue.

So in the pre-released chapters Shallan is able to "be" Drehy and suck in the stormlight that he had used to lash her into the air: I was just doing a re-read and hit the scene in Oathbringer when they try to use the Oathgate and get sent into the Cognitive Realm instead of getting sent back to Urithiru. In that scene, there is a moment where Shallan reaches out to touch a flame and experiences what it is like to be Drehy... coincidence??.... Do you think this is part of how she was able to "be" him and take on his identity, or is this just a random occurence? Does she need to have interacted with someones flame/soul in the Cognitive Realm in order to do something like this? Or is it just a small bit of foreshadowing that she will be doing some Identity stuff in the future? Interesting, no?