Lyn: Things are starting to get a bit… darker in this week’s reread! (Get it? GET IT?) Prepare to learn a bit more about Darkness and his motivation (Good? Bad? We’ll leave that for you to debate in the comments) and glean some more information about the Philosopher, those odd little cremlings, and… what’s this? SZETH MAKES AN APPEARANCE?
Alice: Hello, Darkness, my old friend…
L: Oh no you didn’t just start a sing-a-long. ♫ I’VE COME TO TALK WITH YOU AGAAAIIIIN… ♪
The Awesomeness
Chapter 9: Lift listens in on a conversation between Nale and some of his lackeys. A strange bald man in white with a sword (Szeth! It’s Szeth! With Nightblood! ::fangirl squee::) joins in the conversation, questioning Darkness’s methods and the truth of his claims that only by killing potential Knights Radiant will the Voidbringers be kept at bay. Darkness chastises him for his weakness and temerity in daring to question The Law, then directs his lackeys to find the second Surgebinder in the city before he has to do it himself.
Chapter 10: Lift returns to the orphanage and claims her second meal of three while watching the orphans play in the amphitheater. She has a discussion with Mik (the boy who was abandoned the night before), who doesn’t seem so feeble-minded now; then an exceedingly odd conversation with the Philosopher about life and what it means to be human.
Kadasixes and Stars
“Do you choose, or are you molded by the greater good?”
L: Very interesting that the Philosopher should ask this, considering what Darkness has been saying about the greater good and how questioning is a weakness. What is Lift, and who and what will she become? Will she use her powers for herself, or for the benefit of others?
A: Which segues right into the quote I chose this week:
They all seemed to just… know what to do. Cremlings knew to scuttle, plants knew to grow. Everything had its place.
“The only thing I’ve ever known how to do was hunt food,” Lift whispered.
“What’s that, mistress?”
It had been hard, at first. Feeding herself. Over time, she’d figured out the tricks. She’d gotten good at it.
But once you weren’t hungry all the time, what did you do? How did you know?
Our Girl is in a very weird situation.
L: I don’t find it so weird. I think this is a very relatable thing, really… As we grow older, we gain more personal responsibility over our own lives, and sometimes it can be hard to know what to do without a guiding hand. When you live at home with your parents, you’re told what time to wake up, when and what to eat, where to go. For those who left home to live at college, these things suddenly become their responsibility. Some struggle with it to begin with, just as some struggle when leaving college; now they need to find jobs, juggle work and home life, etc… Lift’s growing up, albeit earlier than most. She may not have wanted to change, but she is. Life itself forces us to adapt and change.
A: I was thinking more along the lines of how she has amazing powers, and she’s gaining a lot of the know-how, and even the insight into what others are doing. What she doesn’t have is any way to know what to do about these cosmic-level issues. There’s no one to turn to for advice on rogue Heralds and little things like that.
L: Not yet, anyway.
A: I do love the way it fits both the real-life and the fantasy, tying the two together, though. As you note, Lyn, it’s very relatable to have that transition to increased personal responsibility, though I would reiterate that few of us transitioned cold turkey to personal independence at ten years old (or younger; we don’t really know when her mother died, do we?). What makes it more fantastical is that she’s now facing epic-level responsibility: the kind of thing few in her world and none in her acquaintance have faced. Powers of a demi-god would be a bit much for most of us to handle anyway; to handle it at thirteen years old, with no parental or any other kind of authoritative guidance would be overwhelming.
Perhaps in some ways, being an orphan has been good preparation for this scenario, though I’d hardly wish it on her. But from a certain angle… she’s been pretty independent for quite a while now, and has grown beyond the time when her sole concern was finding food. Frankly, there’s hardly anyone in the entire world who would be capable of providing guidance in being a Radiant, and none in being an Edgedancer – unless you want to count some mostly-wacko Herald hiding out somewhere on the planet. So maybe that independence is a benefit now?
Even so… having a loving parent or mentor who could simply guide her in general wisdom would help.
L: Maybe she’ll find someone like that in Oathbringer. Someone like Kaladin; I could see him taking her under his wing, given that he’s done that quite a lot with others. We can hope, right?
A: We can hope.
Pet Voidbringer
“Just try not to die too violently, mistress. A nice rap on the head, rather than a disemboweling. I hear that suffocation is nice, though in such a case, don’t look at me as you expire. I’m not sure I could handle it. I’m not sure about falling to your death. Seems like it might be messy, but at the same time at least there wouldn’t be any stabbing.”
A: Wyndle, shut up about all the ways of dying, already! (Obviously, I was laughing like a hyena on this extended monologue, from which I have removed all of the non-Wyndle-spoken stuff just so you could have the unadulterated beauty of it.) But it makes me wonder: Is this attitude because he’s self-centered, or because he really doesn’t understand what death means to a human, or because he’s trying to lighten things up for Lift, or because he’s babbling nervously? Or… is it all leading up to that blatant hint hint about stabbing?
Wyndle: “Wait… Bollocks? I thought you claimed you didn’t say words like—”
L: ::snicker::
Wyndle: “That’s the name of Nalan, the Herald! That can’t be true. They went away, didn’t they? Even we have legends about that.”
L: A nice reminder here that even the spren aren’t omniscient regarding the events of the past.
“You giving me lip, Voidbringer?”
“I think so? Honestly, I don’t know what that term means, but judging by your tone, I’d say that I’m probably giving you lip. And you probably deserve it.”
A: I don’t have anything profound to say about this. It just makes me giggle. I love Wyndle.
Journey before Pancakes
L: Nothing in this chapter, except the clemabread which we talked about before.
A: Which we agreed sounded rather nasty, and this week’s description emphasizes. Yuck.
Friends and Strangers
Makabaki man “with a round, goofish face.” (Darkness’s lackey)
A: I keep looking for something significant about this guy, but can’t find anything.
Reshi woman (Darkness’s lackey)
A: And ditto this woman.
The Philospher
L: He’s back! And still just as odd as before.
“You still creepy, old man?” “I am the man I was made to be.”
“What’s the secret … to being human?” “That I don’t think I know. At least not better than you do.”
L: Because you’re not human, you mean…
A: Nothing like hiding the truth in plain sight!
“Your life may pass, but the organism that is the city will continue on.”
L: Isn’t he some sort of collective consciousness? If so, fitting that he would postulate this.
A: Yep. At this point in the story, he just seems a very odd old man, but by the end we find out that all his weird questions fit right into his weird life form. Which is very, very weird.
Storming Mother of the World and Father of Storms Above
“Everything is changing,” she said softly. “That’s okay. Stuff changes. It’s just that, I’m not supposed to. I asked not to. She’s supposed to give you what you ask.”
It was obvious to her…that she was taller than she’d been when she sought the Old Magic three years ago.
L: ::slowly, sadly removes her tin foil hat and places it on the ground:: Curses. I’d really thought that it had been longer than three years. Maybe…. Maybe she still just thinks it’s been that long… ::picks up the hat and holds it plaintively, but doesn’t don it::
A: ::hugs Lyn:: It’s all right, Lyn. Even the best theories sometimes don’t pan out. And maybe, just maybe… unreliable narrator and all that… Anyway, it’s a very fetching hat. Do hang on to it, you may need it again.
Darkness & Co.
“If you would earn the trust of your spren, and take the step from initiate to Shardbearer, you must dedicate yourselves. You must prove your worth.”
A: This seems an odd thing to say to a Radiant-in-training, based on what we’ve seen before. With the others, there seems to be trust-by-definition in simply forming the bond. So… do they have spren bonds, or don’t they?
L: Well, I suppose a case could be made that the bond isn’t actually formed until the Words are spoken. Syl had been hanging around Kaladin for a long time, but were they technically bonded yet? I didn’t get that impression – not until he officially said the Words. Has Szeth said the Words?
A: Not that we know of, I think. Knowing the way Szeth was recruited, and watching these two, the Skybreakers appear to function differently than the other Orders. It leaves the question hanging: Were the Skybreakers always different, or is this an artifact of the one functional Order vs. individual Knights being bonded at random?
“We must be careful not to be distracted by petty crimes.”
“I once thought as you, but Ishar made the truth clear to me. If the bonds between men and spren are reignited, then men will naturally discover the greater power of the oaths. Without Honor to regulate this, there is a small chance that what comes next will allow the Voidbringers to again make the jump between worlds. That would cause a Desolation…”
L: Hoo boy. Lots to unpack here. For starters, you kind of have to admire him for doing the hard thing. It must be a very difficult path to walk, killing the few to save the many. And of course, when thinking of this subject, only one thing comes to mind…
One could argue that, depending on his morality, Darkness actually has a HARDER job than Spock did. Spock only had to sacrifice himself. Darkness is having to kill others, people whom he knows haven’t chosen this. They are doomed according to their birth or personalities (still uncertain whether or not the potential to be a Surgebinder is solely a personality/being broken thing or if maybe they’re born with some inherent potential), not by the choice to commit a crime. They don’t know what they’re doing, becoming. If Darkness had any sort of a conscience when he began all this, it must have been awful to have to kill innocents for the sake of the greater good. Is this why he’s so distant, so uncaring? Is it a defense mechanism against the things he’s been forced to do to save the world? Has he had to shut off his empathy, forsake his very humanity? In a way, he’s acting quite a lot like Taravangian. If he didn’t have a habit of killing off little kids I’d really like him, I think.
“You’re wrong,” a voice whispered from the darkness. “You may be a god… but you’re still wrong.”
L: 1.) SZETH! 2.) I wonder… will Szeth become a better Skybreaker than the leader of them all? Will he wind up taking over eventually, convincing the others of Darkness/Nale’s fallibility? Will he return humanity to the ranks of the Skybreakers? IS HE THE CHOSEN ONE?
He shifted in his place, and… storms, he left a soft white afterimage behind him, like you get when staring at a bright gemstone for too long.
L: Alice, you’re the authority on Surgebinding. Thoughts on this?
A: Ah, this one I do know, because I occasionally follow the WoB lists. Turns out that this is a result of the way Nale “rescued” Szeth. He was already mostly dead, and when Nale resuscitated him, his soul didn’t stick back to his body properly. So when his body moves, his soul sort of trails along a few inches behind (or something like that). Most people wouldn’t see it, but it would be visible to anyone sufficiently Invested, or to someone like Lift who sees more of the Cognitive realm than most.
“You are questioning, Szeth-son-Neturo. This is not good; this is weakness. To question is to accept a descent into inactivity. The only path to sanity and action is to choose a code and to follow it.”
L: SUNDAY SUNDAY SUNDAY, Lawful Evil vs. Lawful Good! Get your tickets, ladies and gentlemen! ::ahem:: In all seriousness though. To simply accept that law is just without considering ethics and morality is a terrifying concept. This idea was explored a bit in Dark Knight Returns in the conflict between Batman and Superman, but it’ll be very interesting to see how Sanderson deals with it. (I suspect he won’t be as dark and nihilistic as Frank Miller was… at least, I hope he won’t be.)
A: Fortunately for my sanity, Sanderson doesn’t do dark and nihilistic very much. I won’t go down all the philosophical and theological pathways this discussion could take, but Szeth and Nale certainly present a contrast. Szeth does seem nearly immobilized, because he’s not sure what to believe any more, while Nale is all confidently striding around following the Law to the tiniest jot and tittle no matter what kind of a mess it makes. The ironic part is that, not so long ago, Szeth was the one following the letter of the law, even while he hated it. He just spent the last nine years or so doing whatever he was told by whoever held his Oathstone, because his people’s law/tradition said he had to obey every command except to kill himself or to give up his Blade. A path to sanity and action? Well, it was certainly a path to action, but sanity… not so much. This is the first time he’s allowed himself to question authority, and given the past few years, how could he not question it?
“The other orders always did consider themselves beyond the reach of the law.”
L: Interesting. Were they really on a power trip, or is Darkness just pissy because they were actually thinking for themselves and making MORAL and ETHICAL choices (::sarcastic gasp::)? I’m inclined to believe the latter.
A: I’m inclined to assume there was some of both. The limitations inherent in the spren bond are certainly … stretchier in some orders than others, and any time you have humans involved, there will be some who never quite believe that the rules apply to them. On the other hand, we’ve had hints before that the Skybreakers considered themselves to be The Final Authority on who was right and who was wrong, and people with that attitude don’t tend to make allowances for the perspective or values of others.
“Your minds cannot be trusted. Even my mind–especially my mind–cannot be trusted.”
L: Especially?
A: Well, he’s got that one right, anyway. I concur. But I also notice he’s still giving orders…
…the room suddenly darkened. The woman began glowing with a phantom light, and she blushed, looking sheepish.
L: Wait… what? Did she draw the light out of some nearby spheres by accident or something?
A: I think she just sucked all the stormlight out of that big herking diamond Nale was using for a lamp… Oops.
Everything Else
Remember the girl in the market. Steady.
L: Lift, what the heck do you know that you’re not telling us?
“They’re already back. The Voidbringers have already returned.”
A: This is … hard to know what to say. I mean, it has to be pointed out, right? Because Szeth saw what happened on the Shattered Plains, and he saw the magnitude of what was going down – but Nale doesn’t believe him, or at least pretends with all his heart not to believe him. I liked Szeth more in this one chapter than I did in the first two books. He’s finally had it with being forced to lie, and no one has leverage over him any more.
“I have often found [Surgebinders] making contact with one another, these last five years, if I leave them alone. They must be drawn to each other.”
L: That’s a nice little lampshade as to why almost all of our main characters are Knights Radiant now. (Otherwise, it would seem just a shade convenient that for thousands of years we haven’t seen one, then BAM! All of a sudden we have a ton of them all congregating in one spot.)
“Mama always told me to travel,” Lift said. “And go places. While I’m young.”
L: More talk about her mother. She’s been talking about her a lot in this story…
“Mother… come back?”
“Probably not,” Lift said. “Sorry, kid. They don’t come back.”
L: Speaking from experience, Lift? :(
A: These chapters really peeled a few layers off the onion that is Lift. Her Interlude and the early chapters were all this brash, crass, snarky little twerp: she was funny and endearing and obnoxious all at once. Now we seem to be getting a lot more hints at her early life, as well as seeing her uncertainties and the lies she tells herself. She’s oddly mature for her age and circumstances, but somehow it doesn’t feel sudden or unearned at all. Like this was always there, underneath the outer roughness. She’s still the tough street kid, but she’s also a young girl in a dangerous and confusing situation.
The Stump dragged over one of the kids who’d been fighting and plopped him on the stone. Then, oddly, she gave him some earmuffs–like it was cold or something.
L: I’m not well versed on the subject, but could this be a way to calm down a child with ADHD or a similar disorder? Sensory deprivation?
A: I loved this moment. For a kid with sensory processing issues, shutting out all that extra auditory stimulus can be a lifesaver. My son used to go to sleep in the oddest, noisiest environments, because it was the only way he had to shut out the overwhelming input; now he just plugs his ears, and that’s enough to cope with most situations. Some kids withdraw, some get aggressive, some cry, etc. In any case, what they need is help to block out some of the sensory input long enough to get hold of themselves again. I love that this gnarly old woman has figured out the things that work for her kids, probably through a lot of years and a lot of trial and error.
“I miss Mother.”
“We get to remember ours,” Lift said, standing. “That’s more than most like us get.”
L: Argh. Heartbreaking.
A: Knife to the heart, right there. That hurt.
Lift […] smacked her hand at a cremling that had been inching across the step nearby. Starvin’ thing dodged, then clicked its chitin legs as if laughing. They sure did have strange cremlings here. Not like the ones she was used to at all.
L: I don’t think this is because it’s native to this country, Lift… ;)
A: Hah! More of that foreshadowing that you only get to see in hindsight, when it is suddenly Obvious.
Well, things are definitely getting Interesting up in here, even as it gets darker. Join us in the comments – and remember, no Oathbringer spoilers!!
Lyndsey thinks that sometimes it’s a boon having a terrible memory, rather than a curse… she can get almost as much enjoyment out of a reread as she did reading it for the first time. You can follow her writing or cosplay work on her website or follow her on facebook or twitter.
Alice is apparently intent on joining Lyndsey in the can’t-remember-it crew; she used to pride herself on her near-photographic memory, but either the film canister had a light leak, or the memory card got too full. Fortunately for her, there’s always the Coppermind! She is currently elated to tell you (if you weren’t paying attention) that the Kaladin project kickstarter successfully met its goal, and fandom will be getting some epic CDs and artwork before Christmas.
This probably isn’t happening, but I had a dark thought. What if the Skybreakers attract their spren, slowly bond with them, acquiring Shardblades and Plate, and then. . . Break the bond? That would explain where Helarin got his previously unknown set that Amaram now possesses.
Reasons against: Skybreakers wouldn’t look kindly on oathbreaking, though they might loophole their way out of it being wrong. Also, I doubt their bondspren would be so stupid as to keep sending spren after spren that they never hear from again.
This was a very exciting chapter, information-wise. I didn’t care for Szeth at all in the first two books, but in this scene, and the rest of Edgedancer, he grew on me. It is nice to see him questioning now, instead of blindly following. I am very much a rules follower, but there are rules worth following, and ones that should always be questioned (Any that involve killing people, for starters). Also, I had wondered what was up with the light and Szeth – I am glad you could clear that up, Alice. It wasn’t until reading this novella that I realized that there were heralds still around, that they hadn’t died ages ago. Is this something that was hinted at in the first two books, and I just missed it?
I think the Philosopher’s question was not coincidence. I believe he had one of the parts of himself observing Darkness. He also knows that Lift has bonded a spren and is on the path to being a KR.
I disagree with Lyndsey. I do not think Kaladin would have the patience to put up with Lift. He may think she is a kindred spirit initially. Remember while in the army, Kaladin was always on the look-out for lost souls like Lift. However, Lift is far too mouthy for Kaladin to put up with her very long. I think Shallan (from a personality perspective) would relate better to Lift.
Thanks for reading my musings.
AndrewHB
aka the musespren
FYI, I’ve seen people shipping Kaladin/Lift (which I find creepy. Yeah, yeah, I know there’s a time jump planned for the back 5, but still…)
I would personally like to see a Lift / Renarin team up, platonic or (much later, in the second series) romantic. Renarin kind of qualifies as one of the forgotten Lift is supposed to watch out for, and his shyness and awkwardness vs her Lift-ness could be hilarious.
Perhaps you meant omniscient?
Interesting. If the apprentices are able to draw in stormlight and use surges then they’d have to be bonded with a spren already, though the conversation implies that the bond is weak/not guaranteed…
Wait, squires. That must be it–Nale is able to consciously squire his initiates and groom them until they’re able to bond a spren and do it on their own. That’s why they can use stormlight, yet not have a spren.
Also, their backgrounds are probably kept “boilerplate” for a good reason that we’ll see later. I don’t think they even get names.
Sanderson did delve a bit into Lawful Good vs Lawful Evil, or maybe more specifically “follow the law blindly or follow what you believe is Right”, in Alloy of Law. Interestingly, Wax is the “stand up for the Law even if it isn’t perfect” and Miles is the “follow your heart” in that particular conflict.
Alloy of Law and Shadows of Self are both really interesting in a meta way, since the “villains” (Miles and Bleeder) don’t do much killing, and stick to mostly robbery or civil unrest, while Wax kills a shit ton of people but is still somehow the “hero”.
I loved seeing Szeth question. In my reread he just killed the king of Jah Keved, crying the whole time. I wish he had questioned sooner, but then where would we be?
As for who Lift should end up with… I think it’s very premature to say. Her and Shallan could be great buddies, talking about nothing for hours. Almost like Seinfeld with two Elaine’s. I kinda hope she ends up back with Gawx; why should radiants only end up together
@8: Um. Miles was kidnapping women to help forcibly breed an Allomatic army. He was working for people who want to overthrow the current government, which was bound to be bloody. He okayed his men firing at in a crowded room full of unarmed partygoers just to get it out of their system. Not a good guy. Bleeder killed a Terriswoman and harvested her soul for her Ferruchemical ability, sparked a massacre at a party-of criminal overlords, which would lead to a power struggle in the underworld-personally killed the host and his bodyguards, and ate the governor’s bones to impersonate him and spark off a bloody revolt. Not a good guy.
Wax and company kill people who are trying to kill them or others. That there’s a lot of them just means that their enemies are well funded and supplied.
@Thora:
Short answer: yes, it was not just hinted but stated in previous volumes. Heck, at the end of WoR Szeth names Nale and states that he is a Herald.
@11 – Quite a few people seem to miss details like this. There were several people in the Oathbringer cover art post that didn’t know Jasnah was still alive and thought it was a spoiler, even though the entire epilogue of WoR was about her arrival back and meeting with Wit.
@10 I don’t want to get into a big debate on books that aren’t even the focus of this reread, so I’ll just briefly say that yes, Miles and Bleeder are villains. They just don’t kill very much. I did leave out the kidnapping, though the “breeding Allomantic army” is Mr. Suit’s goal, not Miles’s.
And while many of Wax’s kills are self-defense, how many people were killed when he destroyed the largest skyscraper in the city, or when he destroyed an airship in midflight with only one person on it trying to kill him? His bodycount is astronomical.
Anyway. Edgedancer.
edit: oh, and Bleeder is female.
@13, fair enough. Not the place or the time.
On shipping Lift, I tend not to ship much, or even anti-ship, because I am a curmudgeon who hates fun. If Lift grows up to be a Crazy Cremling Lady I’ll be quite content. But I do really want to see her interact with Renarin because of their different personalities. A team-up between them would look like creepy cop /crazy cop to an outsider, and Lift could draw all the attention while Renarin works in the background. And can you imagine her and Dalinar talking? It would be hilarious! Um, I don’t ship Lift and Dalinar, in case it needs to be said. :D
You guys realize Lift is 13, right? All the other characters are 20 or older (save Shallan at 18). Shipping a 13 year old is just a tad skeevy.
I have a question about Szeth’s afterimage. Since Szeth’s soul was put back into his body using a fabrial that Darkness has, his soul is seen as an afterimage to Lift. But doesn’t darkness’s fabrial have the same ability as Lift when she saved Gawx? Therefore shouldn’t Gawx also have an afterimage when Lift sees him?
I laughed at the joke about the woman’s nose. I greatly want to read a snark-off between Lift and Shallan. Or watch them team up and out-snark all of Roshar. But it’s nice to see her talk with the Philosopher, wh o can somewhat hold his own in the conversation.
Though I could do without the joke about everyone having bollocks except possibly the woman.
Sanderson may not “do dark and nihilistic very much,” but when he does, it’s memorable. In my experience, few pronouncements of doom are more chilling and versatile than the one I often use nowadays: “Now the sun approaches the horizon. The Everstorm comes. The true Desolation.”
“Even the small chance that the world will be destroyed is too large a risk to take.” I’d like to hear more of that from people on Earth. When Nalan seems refreshingly wise…
…and then he denies that the Voidbringers have arrived. Never mind.
Hi, Szeth. Not nice to see you again. I disliked reading his scenes of unhappy slaughter in the novels, and was miffed that he wasn’t dead and gone. And now he has Nightblood, as if he wasn’t deadly enough already. Argh.
Lift has tasted “cold socks”? Ewww.
But I do want to be your friend, Lift! Because you’re The Best Ever. Though I don’t feel very qualified to offer guidance on being a responsible adult.
@16 – Gawx wasn’t quite dead when Lift saved him. Or rather, he had just died. It’s not stated how long after Szeth was crushed by the stormwall before Nale got to him, but you can probably assume an hour or more just because there was a freakin highstorm going on.
Plus, Nale uses a fabrial, which is a manmade approximation of surgebinding. Sometimes staplers jam or don’t get it exactly right.
Did you mean Batman vs Superman? Superman wasn’t in the Dark Knight Returns.
It also feels like Nale is using his own tinfoil hat when it comes to the return of Radiants .
I was left wondering on this sentence: Without Honor to regulate this, there is a small chance that what comes next will allow the Voidbringers to again make the jump between worlds.
Umm … with all the world-hopping going on in the Cosmere, am I reading too much into this, or might be the Voidbringers (or at least some of them) also be from outside? Or a different realm?
@20 I think Voidbringers as in Odium-spren live on Braize, another planet in the Rosharin system. It’s mentioned in the forward that it’s populated entirely by Splinters–aspects of a Shard. In Vorin mythology, Braize is also an old term for Damnation. I’m guessing it’s not a nice place. And possibly where the Heralds are tortured between Desolations.
“jump between worlds” could mean a few things in context
First, the obvious/most likely: Voidbringers seem to be Parshendi transformed by Voidspren. All spren are cognitive beings, so the jump here would be from the cognitive realm/world to the physical.
There’s also the possibility that in between desolations the voidspren/some voidbringers actually reside with Odium on Braize (another planet in the Roshar system). During a Desolation Odium could bring them to Roshar proper.
What we’re missing from Nale’s line of thought are the details of the OathPact and what prevents Odium from making it All Desolation, All the Time. Since the surges and spren are indirectly of Honor, it could be that working the power of that Shard would be enough to give Odium a “legal loophole” to become active again. Outside that, it could just be the broken ravings of a immortal madman who cracked just so.
@21, ah, yes, I had forgotten that Odium might not be alone there, and that without Odium-spren, there probably wouldn’t be any Voidbringers to start with. Your answer explains a lot. Honestly, with all the things I miss and/or forget, sometimes I feel like my mind ain’t better than a sieve …
Edit: @22, my answer and thanks extends to your comment which appeared while I was typing
Kippur @19 I believe the reference is to the excellent comic, from which some of Batman v Superman was pulled from, and does indeed have both Superman and Batman in it. Are you perhaps thinking of The Dark Knight Rises?
I too want to see Lift and Renarin hook up. And no, I don’t mean romantically, that’s years away if ever. What I mean is who else could help her figure all this out (and who could she help in turn)? Kaladin, Jasnah, Dalinar, Nale, even Shallan would all have expectations of her and she would immediately rebel against those expectations. Renarin on the other hand, I could see those two just sitting down for a nice chat and learning many things in the process. In a way, they are both the lost outcasts of the fledgling KR. Together, they could help each other find their own path through all this mess. Maybe even stump could join their crew, LOL.
@22 – Brandon did somewhat answer what it wasn’t All Desolation, All the Time. It definitely had to do with the Oathpact and the Heralds presence. Here’s the WoB:
Nothing to add today, but I want the post in my “conversations.”
I don’t think Szeth will end up as a Skybreaker – I think he’ll be in another KR Order. I couldn’t say why – just a feeling I have. And I don’t have a sense of which of the other Orders it’ll be yet. But IMO Skybreaker isn’t a fit for him.
I really don’t understand Nalan attempt to stop desolations by killing radiants. Desolations have been happening for thousands of years before the rise of the radiants and now he thinks killing them all off is going to help? When the radiants started to appear, did Desolations get worse or start quicker with less time to prepare because of the spren bond? What makes Nalan, a herald and part of the oathpact, think radiants have anything to do with desolations? It doesn’t make any sense to me why he thins the two are connected.
Speculating wildly, given our current knowledge of the cosmere, I could see the spren bond create a connection between the cognitive realm and the physical that other voidspren could follow. There has also been speculation that the bondsmith’s broke the bonds between spren and parishmen to turn them into the slaves they are now. If that is the case, then perhaps any spren bond risked allowing voidspren to get back to Roshar and start the desolations back up. Its very unlear to me right now and I hope Oathbringer can clear it up.
Also, is this the first desolation that Honor is dead for? We know there hasn’t been a desolation since the Radiants disbanded and in Dalinar’s visions we saw the Radiants forsake their blades outside a fortress so Honor also knows about this. So when exactly did he die and did the Recreance have anything to do with it?
I’m not sure if Szeth will even be a KR. A figure of influence and power, yes, but he might be too broken even for the spren to help. Also, he’s already got a chatty sword. I’m torn on whether or not he could potentially be Odium’s champion, but I lean more towards not.
@1: Possible, but I don’t think that is likely – the spren wouldn’t stand for dying needlessly. We know from Dalinar’s visions that there were many more pre-recreance KR than there are known shardblades (as of now in the story), so my best guess is that there are many more blades out there in the world than is currently / officially known about, and Helaran’s blade is “probably” one of those.
I want Adolin and Lift to meet. No, nothing romantic. Adolin is too old for Lift for Pete’s sake. LOL
Adolin is so proper and Liff, is well. Lift. It will be so much fun to see them interact. Adolin’s jaw will probably drop and Lift will probably say something sarcastic yet profound.
I also wonder how Shallan will react to Lift. She is also so prim and proper, having been sheltered almost the whole of her life. Lift being a vagabond will be like a breath of fresh air to Shallan.
I can only wish. :-) Perhaps in the second Pentateuch or is it Pentalogy.
The question is, if the above quote from Nalan might be the cause for why the KR abandoned their blades / broke their bonds eventually. But if so the sequence of events as given in Alice’ KR post doesn’t really make sense to me. Did the KR recreance really happpen >2000y after the “last” desolation?
And I’m not at all convinced that the KR where there for more than one Desolation…
@2 Thora , @11. Long answer is that “we” suspected the heralds to be around because of the prologue and then searched for in-book hints of the being still around. The lady destroying art in an WoK interlude is provably another herald.
The recent KR post mentiones the Heralds possible cameo as well if your intetested…
Personally, I ship Taravangian and Lift…..it would totally work.
I shudder to think what will happen to Dalinar’s “police force” when Lift and Syl get together in one place, given how Radiants are treated there.
@6: You are 300% right. Thank you, fixed it.
@19: The comic book by Frank Miller, not the film. :) Superman is basically the government’s lapdog and that rubs ole Bats the wrong way.
@28: I agree. I think he’s going to gravitate towards a different order as well. No idea which one, though…
@35: I laughed out loud.
I had a terrible thought… What if he *IS* Taravangian. Was this what happened on his “most intelligent day”, he somehow figured out how to bond a spren while spliting his physical and cognitive aspect? It might make it so he could never again be that intelligent, but could put into action his crazy plans. Would explain why he doesnt trust his mind, and we know why Taravangian doesnt trust his…
Re: the Heralds – While the first book didn’t come out and say that the nine apostate Heralds were all still around 4500 years later, it didn’t say they’d died, either. When fans started asking questions, Sanderson confirmed that many of the Heralds had actually been seen in TWoK. IIRC, that’s been upgraded to all nine have either been seen on the page, or have been referred to in their current persona. (For example – and this isn’t the case as far as I know – if one of the Heralds were currently posing as one of the Azish viziers, if that person were mentioned in a conversation, that would count as “referred to.”) That might include both books rather than just the first one, but I don’t know for sure.
The music group I traveled with had a 40 y/o blind, autistic piano player. He had runway technician earmuffs he used for the same purpose, when things got to be too much for him on the bus. I never understood the kind of trust he was placing in us when he did it, at the time.
Brenden K Morgan@29:
It has something to do with what Ishar told him. Since we don’t know what that is… Lets just say Nalan knows more than we do at this point, and everything we know for sure, outside of WoB, could be reinterpreted to mean something else at a later date.
My best guess is that it seems that the time between desolations has been significantly longer this cycle, because Taln can withstand torture longer than the others. Perhaps the Desolations start when one of the Heralds calls on his or her power to escape the torture. Its possible that Ishar and Nalan may believe that Taln can withstand Odium’s torture forever.
So, assume for a minute that its the use of their powers that triggers the Oathpact and the Desolations. 1000 years go by, and there is no sign of a new Desolation. Much longer than previous cycles. Ishar realizes its because Taln can resist longer than any of them, maybe forever. But he knows Odium will look for a way to cross over anyway. A loophole. Perhaps Odium has a way to work at the minds of the Heralds and plants the thought, who knows. Ishar thinks that the Nahal Bond is really, really close to their own powers, and in fact, come from the same source. Honor and Cultivation. Perhaps Odium can find a way to use that fact to cross over. Perhaps not. But why risk it, when Taln seems to have locked Odium on Braize forever? So, we get the Recreance. And we get Nalan hunting down proto-Radiants.
As far s Honor’s Death… I think that happened long before the Last Desolation. The KR Spren are Splinters of Honor and Cultivation. I don’t think they existed prior to Honor and Cultivation’s death. The Stormfather is the largest Splinter of Honor. The Nightwatcher is likely the largest splinter of Cultivation, as the cultivationspren call the Nightwatcher “Mother” the same way Syl calls the Stormfather “Father.”
@41 Wait, wait… Cultivation dead? Explain..
Cultivation is not dead, and the fact that Dalinar sees a vision of the Recreance implies that Honor was still whole at that time as well.
@41 spren are Splinters, yes, but not the kind of Splinters that come from…Splintering. It’s frustratingly inexact terminology.
Devotion, Dominion, and Honor were killed and Splintered. (And Adonalsium, obvs.) This prevents anyone from picking up their Shards a la Sazed, which is why we don’t have a Patriotism Shard over on Sel now.
Spren are like Returned – Splinters, but ones voluntarily made. It certainly seems like these can be made without limit; Endowment isn’t stopping, and there’s millions of spren on Roshar and…the, uh, other planet in the system.
@17 Not going to lie, a snark-off between Lift and Shallan has been on my wishlist for a while. Though, I hadn’t considered the possibility of them working together to outsass everybody to death. I might like that even better.
I really liked that the alignment system was brought up in regard to Darkness. :) I had always sort of thought of him as being the epitome of Lawful Neutral, personally. But, I can see how in a “real world” situation, Lawful Neutral could easily shift to Lawful Evil- which, I can definitely see having happened in Darkness’ case.
@42, 43:
There’s WoB regarding Cultivation? I thought the Stormfather was the largest piece of what was left of Honor… so, that means there was no Stormfather prior to Honor dying, right? So, what happened to the rest of Honor’s power? I thought that’s what Honorspren were. And, we’re saying Honor was not already dead during the Prelude?
Yet, Wyndle refers to the Nightwatcher as Mother, like Syl refers to the Stormfather as Father. I made the jump from there to Cultivation being dead as well, and the Nightwatcher being what was left of her.
@46 as far as I can tell, the Stormfather existed alongside Honor for a long time. Spren are all fragments of Honor, Cultivation, Odium, or Adonalsium that kind of bud off the main body. When Honor was shattered, Stormfather was the biggest piece of Honor around, so Honor invested him with the messages as a dying act.
There is a WoB that Cultivation is still alive, as of… WoR, I think. And it’s strongly implied, at least, that all of the visions were things Honor directed Stormfather to pass on, not things SF came up with to show someone.
I LOVED these chapters. I love the Skybreakers, and all the new information about them was really intriguing. I also love Nalan, despite the fact that he’s kind of a terrible person. I do have a tendency to become fond of morally questionable to downright morally reprehensible characters that are really interesting. (Most of these are Sanderson characters because, well, Brandon Sanderson, and include such people as Taravangian, Denth, and Zane.)
Intriguing. This, to my mind, brings up the possibility that the differing philosophies of the different orders had to do with seeking different ways to Honor.
I’m getting a bad feeling about what Ishar is up to. Do we know what he’s been doing? Why does Nalan trust him so much?
I’d like to see a Lift-Renarin teamup too! I feel like there’s at least a possibility that they could get along. However, I think Kaladin and Lift would just clash personality-wise.
Shallan and Lift could have a snark contest with Wit.
Mm-hm. The Snarkmasters of Eastern and Western Roshar, respectively, against the Snarkmaster of the Greater Cosmere. If Hoid out-snarked those two, I would be much impressed.
Snarkbowl! GET HYPE!
The stuff with the abandoned little boy always breaks my heart. And the scene with the earmuffs (both of my kids have some sensory issues so it rung true to me…although neither of them to the point where they need earmuffs).
I find Nale/The Skybreakers an interesting character as I know that kind of mindset (just trying to rely on some objective standard, removing emotion from the equation, etc) is something I am often tempted towards. So I have some sympathy for the mindset that leads to it, even if it becomes pretty apparent how a word ruled that way becomes pretty unpleasant, indeed. And one also wonders if Nale is ‘corrupted’ somehow and that is why he is so extreme.
Add me to the list of people who has questions on Nale’s rationale, and how the Oathpact breaking, the Recreance and Honor’s death all fit together :)
@53 I wonder how much Nale’s arc is supposed to mirror Szeth’s. They both embraced atrocity as a moral duty for reasons which were fundamentally incorrect.
While everyone is interested in shipping Lift (please, let her be 10 for a few more years!), what I would love to see is Jasnah trying to train her. Not that they have any of the same powers, but more as a “how to be in control of yourself through poise and perception” lesson. That series of conversations could be highly entertaining – AND could put Lift on the path of embracing the gracefulness of an Edgedancer by the back half of the series. Well, gracefulness and a healthy dose of street urchin snark. :D
What do you call it when you think two characters should be close friends?
Friend-shipping maybe?
Either way, it would be nice to see Lift become Kaladin’s “Tien” in future books.
@41, 42, 46
In the first Lift interlude, Wyndle puzzles as to why the mother would give Lift the ability to invest by eating food. As we know that Lift has been to see the Nightwatcher, this gives some credence to the idea that the Nightwatcher is some part of Cultivation. (But not proof).
I thought it was pretty hypocritical of Nin-son-God to tell his lackeys to not get distracted by petty crimes when he paused on his way to this meeting to pick up a kid for stealing plums…and then killed her for taking a swipe at him. I don’t think she posed him any threat (though he could be terrified that death would send him back to torture) and I get that he was probably technically acting within the law, but get off your highspren horse Nale.
I wonder if on the past the BEST Skybreakers were what TVTropes calls Rules Lawers. They always played within the letter of the law but weren’t afraid to challenge the way the law was interpreted in order to get justice for the downtrodden or be more lenient if warranted? Possibly even taking things to the Supreme Court if the country they were in had a version of that and possibly even getting them to overturn a previous verdict?
Of course my version of the BEST Skybreaker is probably atypical as it is like a combination Prosecutor (but of the Jack McCoy or Ben Stone from Law & Order type) and Civil Rights Attorney. Only with super powers of course. :
Here’s an outrageous idea; maybe Lift used to be a Listener (Parshendi). With all the references to listening and whatnot, and how she doesn’t/didn’t want to change, and talk of what it means to be human and how to be human… Maybe the Nightmother’s trickery was something like in order for Lift to no longer change, she had to undergo this one final mega-change.
Eh? Maybe? That would be fascinating, but probably quite unlikely.