Falconite

Odiumspren/voidspren/stormspren whatever we want to call them... glowing red eyes and you can cook people (without plate) with lightning! in terms of personality - it would have to be Syl though...

Regarding the first bit - where Brandon says its cultural, not magical... could Urithiru have been soulcast? in tWoK - the traders would bargain anything for soulcast metal scraps... if Urithiru was soulcast - the stones didn't come from the earth and therefore wouldn't be hallowed?

I like the theory - not sure it has much to go on, but plausible... One thing that may or may not have relevance... After tWoK was written, didn't Brandon refer somewhere to a mysterious death in tWoK? Was it ever ascertained who it was? I always thought it was Gaz who disappeared, but then he came back in WoR... Could it have been Taln in the prologue?

I speculated on this somewhere else... but do we know that Gavilar and Dalinar were initially lighteyed or darkeyed? From the books I always assumed they were always highly ranked (from the way they talk etc)... however if bonding to Shardblades lightens the eyes - could they not have been darkeyed soldiers who won shards? and then when one of them got them, he helped the other one win a set? we know the two of them together were great warriors and forged the kingdom together. Dalinar also doesn't have a problem raising a darkeyed spearman above his station, and treats all his men with respect regardless of eye colour (yes I know he follows the codes)... I don't know if this is even likely, could just be me wondering because we haven't yet seen any real flashbacks from Dalinar's younger days... and I like the possibility that the lighteyed king Gavilar was initially darkeyed...

How do you know this though? The only reference I know of is in the prelude to tWoK - where Kalak mentions something along the lines of "he'd been killed by a creature like that before, it wasn't pleasant, of course dying never was"... I don't think it would make sense for the heralds to have their blades with them in damnation... you want to give individuals with investiture an invested sword and surges while in damnation? it'd be pretty hard to torture them when they have their honorblades you'd think... of course I guess it could make sense as to why desolations are brought on - when one of the heralds gets tired of the torture, they could elsecall out (for example)... I'll take a read off Argent and not try to draw conclusions from it, but I still think something odd is happening here.

I haven't posted on this thread having not had a strong opinion either way... but something popped into my mind this morning from re-reading the WoB the other day... One of the WoB mentions Honorblades don't disappear when dropped. The only real evidence we have to this is Kaladin killing Szeth, and Jezrien's Honorblade dropping in the air and whatever bond Szeth had to the blade was broken (I assume). In the prelude to tWoK - Taln died (as far as we know). Would it be logical to assume that Taln's bond to his Honorblade was broken at that point? (again, I'm no expert on this, and apologies if this has been discussed elsewhere, but I couldn't see it anywhere). Whereby, when he comes out of the desolation and goes to the gate and has another "blade" (the cleaver shaped one). I strongly suspect that wasn't his Honorblade, being that he wouldn't have been bonded to it (as he'd died in the desolation 4.5k years ago). I have no idea where he would have got a Shardblade from though... Do we know that it was even a Shardblade though? i.e. as far as I recall (I'd have to check tWoK and don't have it with me right now), it wasn't glowing, therefore it would be unlikely to be a sprenblade. But when he dropped it (when he fell unconscious), it didn't puff to mist i.e. it acted like an Honorblade, but unless the bond somehow goes with them when they die - how did he get it back? Does this mean Szeth will be able to re-summon Jezrien's one that Kaladin has? I'm wondering if the cleaver shaped sword is something else? he's the herald of war, and he's come out of damnation of 4.5k years... maybe it's a big massive sword he somehow managed to get whilst there... a giant cleaver sounds like a great torturing device... As for the spike shaped one - not sure where that has come from - they refer to it as "Taln's" blade - but for all we know it could be anyones... It could have been planted by Wit (notice I didn't say swapped, because we don't actually know if the other one was even moved), or by anyone. The origins are interesting, because who would willingly give up a shardblade for someone else to bond... I'm not sure - I don't know the answers, but something odd is happening here...

Yes, I know. Graves lied to him. I don't think Graves has betrayed Moash yet though... I suspect when they get back to Taravangian, Graves may throw Moash under the bus for not killing Kaladin when he had the chance...

That doesn't really surprise me though... Gavilar and Dalinar forged Alethkar into one kingdom, and despite doing certain things in a bloodthirsty way - Gavilar followed the codes and acted with honour etc, and would have instilled those values into his children... Following Gavilar's death - Dalinar started following the codes and he and Adolin act with honour etc... Being in high-ish positions politically as well might incline them to be more likely to be broken as well... This bit is off topic but was triggered from me in a thought wave... The more interesting question for me - is how the lighteyes/darkeyes thing works... are the lighteyed potentially descendents of Radiants in time past? Does this mean lighteyes are more likely to be radiants? So far we know of five confirmed KR (including Jasnah) and 4 are of lighteyes by birth... Kaladin also has a lighteyed name, and there is speculation his mother could have come from a lighteyed family in other threads... (although I do wonder if Dalinar/Gavilar were lighteyed all their lives - their eyes could have changed because of bonding to Shardblades...). But so far there seem to be a lot of lighteyed Radiants, and not many Darkeyed ones coming through... is it eye discrimination, and perhaps Kaladin is right about the injustice in the world Kaladin was worried about what society would think about a group of glowing slaves... imagine if Rlain bonds a spren and gets a Blade - how will they react to a lighteyed parshendi

I could see Kaladin and Moash facing off in book 5... Moash - has been broken, hasn't attracted a spren, broke his oaths, HATES Elhokar (and hatred is synonymous with Odium), could well find himself betrayed by Graves etc (I suspect Moash won't like being used)... He's always seemed to have a darkness about him. I could see him attracting an unmade or something and becoming Odium's champion I would envisage the fight being something along the lines of the following - Kaladin would be the superior fighter, and winning. But he spares Moash's life to "protect" one of his men... life before death and all that... and then gets killed for his trouble, but finally sets down his boulder about not being able to save his men before his death... (side note - I really enjoyed the bit in WoR when Dalinar set down his "boulder" realising he couldn't have saved Gavilar - referencing the boulder parable from tWoK). (and then ironically, it wouldn't surprise me if he got healed or something or came back as a herald).

I get the feeling that this is because using an honor blade - Szeth needs more stormlight to do things than a KR, and once the stormlight runs out, he'd be stuck! as a KR uses less stormlight, I think this would be ok for someone like Kaladin.

I hope so... purely because I'd love to see how a real Skybreaker interprets the actions of these "renegade" skybreakers who are killing surgebinders...

I know - it's a bit of a conundrum... I'm happy to accept Kaladin either way, because Syl kind-of was there at the time, unbonded perhaps, but there... but the piece about Dalinar is just plain odd... it's a unique ability of the bondsmiths (as evidenced by the chapter epigraph) and he displayed it well before any bonding of the Stormfather... that being said, by sending Dalinar visions from as early as book one - had the Stormfather somewhat "chosen" him reluctantly? I don't have an answer... The other piece that is kind of odd about Dalinar - after he injures his shoulder in battle and the surgeon/healer (I forget what word was used in the book) - she asks him how many times he's been injured, and implies that he shouldn't even be able to use his arm at all from the scar tissue etc! Accordingly, I wonder if it's possible for potential KRs to manifest some abilities (e.g. improved healing - not stormlight healing per se, but improved healing) before any interaction with spren...

I do suspect that the Knights Radiant have some form of powers not granted by their spren... Examples of this include (sorry I don't have the exact quote with me from tWoK): In tWoK - Kaladin fighting so well BEFORE he has said any words, before he has attracted Syl, and before the bond develops. I remember a piece at the start when Cenn was wounded - and he saw Kaladin fighting down the enemy spearmen - he thought he saw the wind warping around Kaladin as he moved the spear... (granted this could potentially have been in the early days when Syl was attracted to him, however Kaladin was not bonded at that point and had said no oaths). In WoR - Dalinar does not bond the Stormfather until the end of the book. In Chapter 8 - page 125 in my book there is the following: Dalinar narrowed his eyes at the battlefield, reading it. "No," he said softly. The general stopped giving orders. Aladar glanced at Dalinar. "The Parshendi are preparing to pull back," Dalinar said. "They certainly don't act like it". "They want some room to breathe,"Dalinar said, reading the swirl of combat below... The first time I read this, I thought this might mean Dalinar's experience in plateau runs allowed him to see their tactics, but when read in conjunction with the epigraph from chapter 58 about Melishi and the unique abilities of the Bondsmiths (e.g. he developed a new strategy)... I think that the Bondsmiths can read battles, develop strategies etc (this links to other people who have suggested Dalinar is more tactical in nature etc)... The problem being - when Dalinar did this initially - he wasn't a bondsmith, he was unbonded, and had said no oaths... And this then made me think of Kaladin fighting so well before he was bonded... I do think that these traits are something to do with their surges, but the bond - not so much... The only thing I can think of is that their respective spren chose them before the bond was developed, e.g. Syl was attracted to Kaladin for protecting the young spearmen, and the Stormfather sent Dalinar visions etc - so maybe the bond was already developing? It doesn't feel right though... *Edit* apologies for the lack of formatting, for some reason my browser is playing up.

Just a quick thought on this - surely only one of the people discussing it in the scene is a herald? Otherwise wouldn't they have used the words "our lord's own blade"... these words also suggest that Jezrien is indeed alive (I know there is speculation he is anyway but this gives further credence)...

Spoilers ahead from Book 2 (sorry, my BB Code isn't currently working): A couple of you above have mentioned Jasnah and Kaladin might meet up in Book 3... At the end of book 2 - Dalinar asks Kaladin how much light will it take him to get to Hearthstone, and maybe he'll have enough to get to Kholinar afterwards... My prediction is he won't have enough (I posted that already) and that maybe his parents still have the goblet of spheres which was to be his inheritance and he'd use that... Alternately, he meets up with Jasnah, and she elsecalls them to Kholinar (it potentially uses less light)...

Makes sense that the next one will display Leadership. Kaladin has finally accepted he is a KR, a windrunner of old, born to ride the winds and control the sky. He's going home to help his people survive what is coming. He will take charge. He will also go to Kholinar - he won't have any light left to "fall" there, but anyone else want to bet his father has kept the goblet of spheres as they are Kaladin's birthright? And Kaladin will then take charge there...

True, however Kaladin's greatest quality so far is the need to protect others... If Kaladin was put in a position where the entire planet, including his family needed protecting - I'd say he'd last a fair while... He'd whine and moan about it, but he'd take punishment like a champion to protect others...

Alternately, they knew if they threw down their arms and surrendered, the regular people had no hope against voidbringers without blades... maybe they were giving up for some reason but still wanted humans to be able to protect themselves? Life before death and all that...

Quick random thought on the Day of Recreance (apologies if someone has posted this before, but I didn't see it). Maybe the Day of Recreance occurred because of the following: The heralds broke the Oathpact, they couldn't sustain it, they told the people they won (harkening back to the quote in the prelude to tWoK), maybe they would be right; The Radiants believe the heralds, that they won, after all, the KR were founded on the preception of the Heralds - they wouldn't lie after all; Next desolation comes - Radiants realise they have been lied to, the Heralds who are meant to be of Honor lied to them. KR question their oaths - if splinters of Honor can lie to them about something so important - do their oaths matter? They quit. They decide if the Heralds can walk away from their responsibility, so can they. Just a thought - may well be wrong...

And on this topic - can we then give Kaladin an honorblade with a transportation surge? then whoever fighting kaladin would have the fun job of not only seeing where his abilities are taking him, but he could transport to a spot above you then lash at you without you seeing him... oh the fun . It's hard to say what surges a windrunner would benefit from the most, I'm thinking transportation, soulcasting (that could be in the same blade potentially), regrowth, lightweaving could all be fun - not to mention division etc... I still think of windrunners as almost the elite fighting troops of the KR... purely because you could get them to somewhere where a battle is going poorly relatively quickly, even if there were no oathgates nearby. Then again - it's hard to say whether KR's with the transportation surge can move just themselves, or multiple people at once...

I hadn't even considered it, but you're right, that would have been pretty amusing... It probably also could have been appropriate right after Kaladin and Adolin schooled four shard bearers in a duel with only Adolin's shards between them... and they took home six shards from that one bout...

Oh the other thing I forgot to mention which I'll add into the OP when I get a chance... one of the things that made me think about it is that these days the Plate is "powered" by the gems inside the Plate, however:

This is my first "real" post on this site and haven't seen anything that covers off this topic (I may be wrong, I've only been reading here for a couple of months) so apologies if I am saying something that someone else has thought of... I don't really know - just thought it was something interesting to consider.

Hi everyone, Finally got around to registering (have been a long time reader of the forums), good to be here and hopefully I can add something of value at some point. Cheers