Well, our Cosmere Chickens, sadly all good things must come to an end, and so must this reread. In this final chapter, we get a stunning moment in which Hoid of all people is bested, proving that he’s certainly not as omniscient as he likes to believe that he is.
Reminder: we’ll be discussing spoilers for the entirety of the series up until now – if you haven’t read ALL of the published entries of the Stormlight Archive (this includes Edgedancer and Dawnshard as well as the entirety of Rhythm of War), best to wait to join us until you’re done.
[In this week’s discussion we also discuss some things from Warbreaker and Tress of the Emerald Sea in the Cosmere Connections section, so if you haven’t read it, best to give that section a pass.]
Front Matter
Heralds: Joker, Wild Card
Shalash (Ash), Herald of Beauty. Lightweavers (Illumination, Transformation). Creative/Honest. Role: Artist
L: The Joker always appears in a Hoid POV chapter, and Shalash is here because Hoid is also now a Lightweaver. (As if he didn’t have enough powers, right?)
Icon: Double Eye
Chapter Recap
WHO: Wit/Hoid
WHEN: 1175.4.10.5
(Note: For the “when” notations, we are using this wonderful timeline provided by the folks at The 17th Shard.)
WHERE: Elhokar’s palace in the Shattered Plains
RECAP: Wit heads off to the Shattered Plains, intending to meet with Odium and gloat. However, he gets more than he intended, and Taravangian plays him for a fool.
Chapter Chat – Illusion
“Storytelling,” he said to the hallway, “is essentially about cheating.”
P: And flat out lying!
L: Well, sure. Fiction is lying, from a certain point of view.
“The challenge,” he said, “is to make everyone believe you’ve lived a thousand lives. Make them feel the pain you have not felt, make them see the sights you have not seen, and make them know the truths that you have made up.”
L: As a writer… yeah. This is accurate.
P: Sooo accurate! You have to be so profound at times when telling a story. Like I can scarcely get out of bed some days but I’m supposed to make my readers believe my version of make believe?
“Get them to anticipate a punch and brace themselves, so you can reposition. Always hit them where they aren’t prepared.”
L: Very good advice for any aspiring authors out there. Not that I would usually advocate taking Wit’s advice on… well, almost anything, but this is an exception.
P: I think Wit has given some very good advice so far throughout this series. I don’t know about his motives, but I do like the way he’s talked with Kaladin and Shallan.
L: For Shallan, yes. Kaladin I’m kind of torn on, as Wit can be a bit condescending with him.
Wit cocked his head. There was something odd about this change in tone from Odium. Asking whom Wit would choose? Rayse wouldn’t care to know.
Never mind, Odium said quickly. It matters not.
L: Ah hah. Taravangian realized his mistake.
P: I was hoping he would continue to make mistakes. But really, I found it unusual that Taravangian thought he could outwit Hoid. What happens notwithstanding… it showed a lot of arrogance.
L: Maybe? Now that Taravangian’s got the powers and memories of a literal god, I don’t think it’s necessarily arrogant of him to expect to be on an even footing (at least) with Hoid.
It’s all about giving you what you expect.
L: Nice full-circle back to what Hoid was talking about at the beginning of the chapter. This whole chapter is all about misdirection and illusion.
P: And unfortunately, Wit gets the raw end of the deal here.
Something was wrong. But what?
L: What indeed? And what repercussions is this going to have, long-term?
P: I hope he figures it out, and soon, and that it can be reversed, whatever T did.
Spren & Shadesmar
…a few odd spren were following in the air. Almost invisible, and trailing red light. Windspren—but the wrong color. She was expanding her influence, that old one was. He was curious where it would lead. Also horrified. But the two emotions were not mutually exclusive.
L: So Sja-anat is extending her influence, eh? I’m just as curious as Wit to see where this winds up going. Is there a limit to how many spren she can corrupt?
P: I wouldn’t expect that there would be a limit. Unless Odium finds her out.
L: It’s possible. If she’s extending some of her own power into them in order to corrupt them, for instance, it stands to reason there could be a limit.
Cosmere Connections
Wit sighed, tossing four coins in the air, then catching them and presenting one solitary coin.
“They don’t even use those for money here,” Design added. “So you’ll only distract them. Use spheres.”
L: Nice little call-out to Mistborn, or at least I’d assume. Scadrial is the world that most often uses coins, at any rate.
P: Yes, I’m assuming that’s where these are from. I love that Design tells him to use spheres, and he uses the excuse that they glow. You could use dun spheres, dear.
Wit started down a side hallway, but then felt something. A tingling that made his Breaths go wild.
L: As of this moment, we know that he is at least of the Second Heightening, which grants him perfect pitch, the ability to recognize unsupressed Breath auras, and judge about how much breath another Awakener has. Now… I suspect that it’s not just Breath auras he can sense, and any elevated Investiture would be recognizable, and that’s how he senses Odium in this instance. I seriously doubt that Odium has Breath, specifically. (Yet.)
P: Yeah, we haven’t had any inkling that he has at this point.
“Sense, Odium. The only kind I have is nonsense.”
L: I find it very interesting that he speaks quite a lot about sense here… and sense is the thing that’s taken from him in Tress of the Emerald Sea.
P: His cents and scents notwithstanding, Wit does have some sense. Except in Tress, of course.
I hate you.
“Rayse, dear,” Wit said, “you’re supposed to be an idiot. Say intelligent things like that too much, and I’ll need to reevaluate. I know you adjusted the contract, trying for an advantage. How does it feel to know that Dalinar bested you?”
P: Did Dalinar best him, though? I mean, if Wit says it’s so, then it’s so, right? Storms, I hope so.
L: Best? I don’t believe that. Thrown him off his game for a moment, sure. Everyone makes mistakes (as Hoid is showing us quite clearly in this chapter), so I wouldn’t call Dalinar’s success here an unequivocal win. Once we see how it all turns out we’ll be able to better judge this.
P: I have so much anxiety about SA5, it’s not even funny.
Was Rayse growing more thoughtful? Wit didn’t need to worry, did he? After all this, Odium would be safely imprisoned, no matter what happened. There was no way out.…
Unless …
Wit’s breath caught, but then he forced himself to keep whistling and walking.
P: Unless what? WHAT??
L: I hate it when authors do this.
A power slammed into him from behind. A golden energy, infinite and deadly. Wit’s eyes went wide, and he gasped, sensing something horribly wrong about that power.
P: This is terrifying. And what’s horribly wrong? Is it that Taravangian is way worse than Rayse was?
L: Either that or there’s something about Cultivation’s gift that’s interfering or corrupting it. But I’d be more willing to accept the former. I suspect that the gift was lost when Taravangain ascended from one body to another. (Which would mean that these gifts are linked to your physical form and not your soul/cognitive form, which is a whole ‘nother can of theoretical beans I’m fascinated to find out about.)
Let me see … I cannot harm you. But here, you have used this other Investiture to store your memories, haven’t you? Because you’ve lived longer than a mortal should, you need to put the excess memories somewhere. I can’t see your mind, but I can see these, can’t I?
For the first time in a long, long while, Wit felt true terror. If Odium destroyed the Breaths that held his memories …
L: This is really cool. The concept of holding memories within Breaths/Investiture reminds me a little of the memories drawn out of people and placed in the pensieve in the Series That Shall Not Be Named. I wonder if memories could be stored in any Investiture, or if there’s something special about Breaths that allows them to be utilized in this manner…
P: Cool, I never thought about the pensieve before. This is a really interesting concept, actually. That Hoid has memories stored in Breaths like they were in a pensieve.
He tried to find a tune to whistle, but each one sounded wrong. Something was fiddling with his perfect pitch.
L: So in order to destroy those short-term memories, T-Odium either destroyed or removed the Breaths, leaving Wit with less. I don’t believe that Investiture can be destroyed, much like energy cannot be destroyed in our world. I would be much more inclined to believe that T-Odium took those breaths. The question is… how much did he take, and in so doing, could T-Odium see the memories they contained? Just how many hundreds of years of memories could Hoid have stored in there? It’s a terrifying thought to think that he might have just learned all of Hoid’s plans over the years. I doubt that he would have only squirreled away his short term memories, after all.
Will he notice the loss, eventually? Only time will tell.
P: He’s got to notice eventually, right? But will he realize what happened once he does notice?
His audience of corrupted windspren trailed after her. Traitors.
L: I always love Wit POV chapters. His character voice is just so much fun.
P: I just adore Wit. As untrustworthy as he may be, he is one of my favorites.
I noticed your touch on the contract, a dramatic voice said in his head.
“You’ve always been a clever one,” Wit said. “Was it my diction that clued you in, my keen bargaining abilities, or the fact that I included my name in the text?”
L: Classic Hoid.
P: I adore his sarcasm. I can only dream about being so wonderfully sarcastic.
“Let me know how the brooding treats you. I spent a century doing it once, and I think it improved my complexion.”
L: Ah, so he could actually give Kaladin some pointers!
P: Well Kaladin’s complexion just got markedly better on its own!
***
We’ll be leaving further speculation and discussion to you in the comments, and hope to join you there! It’s been a pleasure re-reading with you, as always. Hopefully there will be more to talk about before it’s time to dive back into the next Stormlight novel. Is there something that you’d like to see us cover, or other Sanderson-related topics or characters you’d like to discuss in greater depth? Let us know in the comments!
Paige resides in New Mexico, of course. She’s very happy that baseball is back and can’t wait to go watch the Yankees play in Los Angeles in June! She also looks forward to starting another reread for you all. Links to her other writing are available in her profile.
Lyndsey is starting rehearsals for Robin Hood’s Springtime Faire in just two weeks, and she’s incredibly excited. If you enjoy queer protagonists, snarky humor, and don’t mind some salty language, check out book 1 of her fantasy series. Follow her on Facebook or TikTok!
