Salkara

TWoK had 11 chapters before the first set of interludes. WoR had 12 chapters before the first set of interludes. We've now had a total of 15 chapters. Is Kaladin surrendering to the newly freed parshmen and Shallan sleeping happily big enough cliffhangers for the first set of OB interludes next week?

And lucky that he still has the slave brand, so the newly freed slaves will identify with him.

And yet, I've seen many people espouse theories which take for granted that the Shin have tons of arcane knowledge. If they know so much about Honorblades, then why did Szeth take 10 heartbeats to summon his?

Thoughts: Syl: Just. Do. It. Pattern: Wait for marriage! Can we get a kickstarter for a 70s-porn/spren alblum? BOW CHICKA BOW W-NO MATING!

Don't have time to do this right now (and on mobile anyways), but has anyone thrown it into GIMP or PS to fix the angle and then tried to run it through OCR? Edit: Here's what I can see: And finally the King, broken by war, he seeks the past. That which was [???]. That which he [??? ??? ???].

I know we don't actually see it, but hasn't this already happened? Lift mentions the guy with white hair who got eaten by a giant fish or something.

This might be going a bit too deep. Per the TFE annotations, silver was initially going to be the internal pulling metal, so if there's any significance, it was written in much later in the writing process. Additionally, per the HoA annotations (putting the following in spoiler tags because it's still spoilered on the annotation page): So, initially, the earring was supposed to be silver rather than silver-plated.

I'm referring to this epigraph in particular: More and more, I think there may be something to this. Dalinar the Politician is horribly ineffective, and I don't think he has the time to build up enough political acumen to actually be good at it. Contrast this with Dalinar the Warlord, who is able to draw the loyalty of a man who had just been trying to kill him (thinking of Teleb here). Dalinar the Politician tried to maneuver Elhokar into making him Highprince of War, enforce the Codes, and make the highprinces work together. Dalinar the Politician failed miserably. Dalinar the Warlord kicked the king in the chest and made all the above happen. Dalinar the Warlord seems to succeed where Dalinar the Politician flounders. I think there's a potential for Dalinar's journey in this book to be partly about discovering that he can be both the Warlord and a good man. If so, I think this line from Tanalan may prove to be an interesting bit of foreshadowing:

Why does he feel ashamed? Because he's a main character in Sanderson series. Most of Sanderson's readers don't analyze each word like Sharers do and, more importantly, aren't desensitized to child murder. Please name a Sanderson protagonist who has been okay with killing children. Even sociopathic Kelsier was opposed to it.

In Dalinar's first vision (that we see, where he battles the Midnight Essence), the Radiant lady states that the Knights live in Urithuru and in cities across Alethela. I'd argue that the "Deadzone" doesn't have oathgates because it was flush with Radiants, and the other nations needed oathgates because Radiants only lived in Urithuru and Alethela (at least during the 8th epoch). Doesn't mean the Voidbringers can't use it as a staging area now though.

Re-reading my post, I'm not sure if I explained my view well enough. The Eshonai POV chapters in WoR painted the listeners as a varied, complex society. It seems a shame to me to turn them all into dark, evil creatures just one book later. In a series with the injustice of societal prejudices as a central theme, I want the ending to include peace and acceptance between all species on Roshar, and that's going to be exceedingly difficult if one species in completely evil. I expect, from a story-telling POV, that some listeners will be Voidbringers, and others will have normal listener forms. How this works, I don't entirely know, but it does provide space for readers to empathize with the parshmen. I mean, if all parshmen are now Voidbringers, who's going to be sad they were oppressed? If they're all Voidbringers, then humanity should've killed them instead enslaving them, and I don't think that's the narrative Brandon wants. My personal theory (right now at least; probably shelved tomorrow at 9am) is that there is a voidspren equivalent to the Nahel bond. Such that all listeners are capable of bonding with a spren but only a broken soul with the right mindset can bond a voidspren. I feel somewhat confident in this based on the responses Dalinar got from other monarchs, the WoB on how parshmen might not bond in the middle of a storm (can't find the link atm; on mobile), and the simple fact that it creates a more complex plot.

That just seems so out of character for Elhokar to me that I can't see it being the case. We've seen Elhokar be an ineffective leader who wants to do better. We've seen him be hotheaded and paranoid. We've seen him overreact to minor transgressions. In 2000+ pages, I don't recall, however, seeing him be that duplicitous.

Didn't Adolin injure his wrist fight Szeth?

If Elhokar was acting without external support, I'm sure there would be an issue. Once Adolin's actions come to light (as I assume they must), Elhokar will have all the other highprinces (and likely Dalinar, as well) supporting massive punishment for Adolin. In that scenario, Elhokar will have the capacity. As for the Kholinar army, I'm not saying 100% of them will go for Dalinar; however, even if half followed Adolin, it's not enough for a successful rebellion. Besides, the only way I see this being an issue is if Adolin fights his punishment, which I doubt will happen.

I'd argue that Dalinar's army is loyal to Dalinar. For the last few years, Adolin has been a commander in the army, but the commanders in the army were loyal to Dalinar. That will ebb as Adolin replaces the old guard (of which there is a vacuum after the Battle of Narak), but for the immediate future, the army will side with Dalinar over Adolin if it comes to rebellion.

Kaladin was thrown in jail with no maximum sentence specified. As far as the men in Bridge Four knew, he could be in there for years, and they aren't the types to give lighteyes any benefit of the doubt (you know, because they were bridgemen... and had to push bridges through a hail of arrows without armor). Teft told them to stay in line though, so they did. If Elhokar punishes Adolin, and Adolin accepts the punishment, I don't see Bridge Four or the Kholinar army rebelling. I can see them being upset, but that's all.

Not really. From WoR Ch 66:

That "whodunnit" thread's off the front page, but does anyone else believe a sleeper Diagrimist could be behind the copycat murder? Maybe Diagram foresaw Adolin killing Sadeas in Urithiru. Could possibly work well into the plan to take down Dalinar.

Questions: How did the book get to Urithiru? As far as wee know, Urithiru wouldn't have been accessible. If the book is found in Urithiru, it probably predates the Recreance. Of course, that also means women wouldn't be the only ones who read it as Vorin male illiteracy wasn't a thing until later. How did the Sunmaker access Shadesmar? Knight Radiants and, more specifically, Nahel bonds didn't exist during his lifetime.

I just had a thought (one that's probably been put here before, but maybe not). Brandon has said part of his inspiration for the storms on Roshar was the Great Red Spot, a massive, perpetual storm on Jupiter. Is it possible that highstorms are actually one perpetual storm which is centered off the proto-continent and has "arms" that sweep across it on a regular basis? If so, the Everstorm could be similar, just placed on the opposite of the continent. It's been awhile since I looked at planetary sciences, so if anyone is more versed in them, please feel free to correct me, but I believe this would require the Roshar continent and both storms to be completely inside one hemisphere. If the storms were in separate hemispheres with Roshar in between, Coriolis forces would cause the storm "arms" to spin in opposite directions and thus cross the continent in the same direction. An easy way to disprove this would be to show that the continent is just too big. Roshar, the planet, is 0.9 cosmere standard in size which (iirc) means in relation to our Earth (or Yolen, but really Earth), but I don't know if it means 90% of Earth's radius, surface area, or volume. If it refers to: Radius, then Roshar has an approximate surface area of 413 million sq. km (or about 81% of Earth's surface area). Surface area, then Roshar has an approximate surface area of 459 million sq. km (or about 90% of Earth's surface area). Volume, then Roshar has an approximate surface area of 475 million sq. km (or about 93% of Earth's surface area). Does anyone know if any of those are big enough to fit the Roshar continent with a storm above and a storm below inside a single hemisphere? I guess it's also possible that Brandon and Peter have done another weird planet thing (like separating geographic and magnetic poles in Scadrial) which allows for two perpetual storms and a single giant continent between them. Actually, I think this is likely as it could also explain the shorter (and variable) seasons and why the Weepings occur biennially instead of annually. I just don't know enough about this subject to really work it out.

@maxal I can't believe Adolin's murder will remain hidden. I can't believe he'll get a free pass for his actions. I mean, this isn't Westeros. So, let's assume Adolin will eventually be outed as Sadeas's murderer and list out some recent events, in order: Adolin murdered Sadeas. A member of Sebarial's army is murdered in the same manner as Sadeas. Elhokar makes Dalinar highking of Urithiru. Adolin becomes highprince of Kholinar. From the perspective of the other highprinces, it's going to look like Elhokar and Dalinar are, at best, trying to cover for a sociopathic Adolin by putting him in an untouchable position ex post facto and, at worst, actually complicit in the murders. Throw into this that the second murder takes place among Sebarial's camp, and the Kholins will be hemorrhaging allies. Even if Ialai isn't behind the second murder, you know she'll take advantage of it to attack them politically. After Adolin's actions come to light, if no punishment is meted out, Alethkar will divide back into competing princedoms. In order to keep the kingdom together, Elhokar will have to come down hard on Adolin. My gut tells me the punishment will involve giving his Shards to Sadeas's princedom as recompense. Possibly land as well. I can't see Adolin fighting the punishment. If he did, Elhokar (and Dalinar) would have to side with the other highprinces and make war upon Adolin in order to keep the country unified. Aside from the practical issues of rebelling against his father, cousin, and the rest of Alethkar, Adolin seems like the type who would rather accept his punishment for the good of others than fight tooth and nail against it. @muco As for whether Bridge Four will fight against Adolin's punishment... they didn't fight Kaladin's imprisonment. They were told not to do anything, and they followed orders. I can't imagine they'll act differently here. Same goes for the Kholinar army. I believe most of the Kholinar army will refuse to rebel against Dalinar. They were recruited to fight for Dalinar, not his son, and it'll be awhile before they're "Adolin's" men. Of course, it's entirely possible that the plot requires a divided Alethkar. Desolations destroy civilization after all. Adolin might accept punishment and still see Alethkar break apart. Knowing that he caused the division of the country his father and uncle built may be consequence enough for Adolin. As a silver lining, if Alethkar divides, the Sadeas princedom could be overrun by voidbringers and receive no help from its neighbors. I'm imagining a scene where Ialai gets her comeuppance as a snack for a hungry thunderclast. I have a hard time believing the Rosharan nation-states we're accustomed to will remain static throughout the series. For this Desolation to live up to its hype, nations have to fall, and it can't just be ones we aren't attached to (like, who really cares if Babatharnam gets destroyed?). As we read this series, we should keep in mind that Brandon isn't afraid to kill characters or destroy places for a great plot. Much of what has been presented as rock-solid is probably going to end up with the consistency of Play-Doh.

I think a group yelling, "Praise the Herald who hid among the ardentia!" is a lot more likely than a lynch mob.

Okay, then I'm probably just conflating 17S rules with the subreddit's rules. Thanks. And yeah, that's the reason I specifically left off the "?" off one of the islands as described in Kaza's interlude.

Interesting. Brandon did say that it would take something more than just the oaths to bring a deadblade back. Maybe that "something more" involves Awakening?

I can't find it right now, but I remember seeing a WoB to the effect that Cryptics like to spy on important people to stay current on political affairs. So, it's possible that Elhokar saw Cryptics because he's king and not because he's a potential Lightweaver.