Lyn: Greetings, brightlords and ladies! Welcome back to yet another installment of the Oathbringer reread—which, judging by how “swiftly” my bookmark is creeping through the book, will be running well into the next year. But hey, that just means more time to spend analyzing theories and arcs, swooning over characters, or facepalming over their actions, and of course hanging out with all of you in the comments section! (I promise we’ve been reading your comments, even if we haven’t been contributing too much lately.) And, of course… waiting for Sanderson to begin writing book 4, so we can all obsessively start watching that little meter start going up on his website.
Oh. Is that just me?
Alice: ::ahem:: ::shifty-eyes::
L: ::cough:: Anyway! This week’s chapters are both featuring Shallan, which means lots of snark, adorable conversations with Adolin, and mysterious machinations being played out by the Ghostbloods behind the scenes! And, of course…
Chickens. Glorious glorious Rosharian chickens. Or… maybe not Rosharian? Join us, won’t you?
Reminder: we’ll potentially be discussing spoilers for the ENTIRE NOVEL in each reread. This week, there are also minor spoilers for Sixth of the Dusk in the Cosmere Connections section, so beware of that. But if you haven’t read ALL of Oathbringer, best to wait to join us until you’re done.
Chapter Recap
WHO: Shallan
WHERE: Urithiru—Sebarial’s quadrant, Sadeas’s quadrant
WHEN: 1174.1.3.5 (Afternoon following Veil’s binge in Chapter 18)
Shallan crawls out of bed, hung over and exhausted, to find Adolin asking her to accompany him to a meeting with Sadeas’s widow, Ialai. They have a brief conversation about how to treat your subordinates, then arrive at Sadeas’s section of Urithiru only to find Mraize of the Ghostbloods serving Ialai.
Shallan goes off into the other room with Mraize, where he orders her to do what she’s already doing—investigate the strangeness in Urithiru, and secure it. In return, he’ll give her information on her dead brother, Heleran. They return to the main room where Ialai instructs Adolin to pass along any information he discovers on Sadeas’s murder to the man leading her own investigation—Highmarshal Amaram.
Threshold of the storm
Titles: Set Up to Fail; The Darkness Within
A: Neither of the titles are direct quotes from the chapters this week. The first, “Set Up to Fail,” is a quote from the beta version, which was edited out, but it’s still implied:
A failed soldier is often one that has been failed, one set up to fail.
It was suggested as a title because along with the way Shallan has inadvertently set her soldiers up for failure, the chapter ending also feels that Shallan is being set up.
The second, “The Darkness Within,” is IMO a brilliant choice. It reflects not only the darkness (referred to by Mraize) within Urithiru, but also the secret Shallan accuses Adolin of having, Shallan’s own myriad dark secrets, probable darkness within the Ghostbloods (who want to use the presence of Voidbringers for their own ends), and all of the other dark mysteries hanging over our heads at this point.
L: Not to mention foreshadowing the actual literal darkness within Urithiru right now—the Midnight Mother.
Heralds
A: Chapter 21 shows Chana, the Guard, patron of Dustbringers, Brave & Obedient. I’m thinking there are plenty of guards here to justify her! But seriously, the conversation between Adolin and Shallan about her guards, and the reason they need to be there, is some profound insight. The chapter also shows Adolin obeying Dalinar’s request to talk to Ialai, a thing he really dreads. And then of course there’s Ialai’s new “guard”…
Chapter 22’s Herald is Paliah: the Scholar, patron of Truthwatchers, with the divine attributes of Learned and Giving. This is more challenging to interpret. On a guess, it’s at least partly reflective of Mraize’s instructions to Shallan to find the source of the darkness. Another reason might be Adolin’s logic regarding Dalinar’s obvious lack of culpability for Sadeas’s death, Ialai’s reluctant and hostile acceptance of his argument, and the totally hostile agreement between the two about how the investigation should proceed.
Icon
Both are Pattern, because the POV is solely Shallan’s.
Epigraph
I am no storyteller, to entertain you with whimsical yarns. I am no philosopher, to intrigue you with piercing questions.
—From Oathbringer, preface
L: Interesting that Dalinar should say this, considering the famous quote from Wit from book 1:
“The purpose of a storyteller is not to tell you how to think, but to give you questions to think upon.”
Both of the Oathbringer quotes play into this, and I think it points out how very differently Dalinar and Wit view the act of storytelling. Dalinar, who is straightforward almost to a fault, doesn’t seem to believe that there could be any further message underlying his words. He just wants to get his story out, to come clean. He seems to be blind to the fact that this story may resonate with others and give them questions to think upon. Good thing Wit’s not around to rub this in his face…
Stories & Songs
For now, they occupied little pockets of civilization within the dark frontier that was Urithiru.
A: This is in the context of how each of the eight highprinces who have come to Urithiru have a quarter of either the second or third level, with the first level used for storage and markets, but it’s still largely unexplored. Every time this is pointed out, it grabs me again: this place is enormous. What little we know indicates that the very top level is big—and then each level below has to get significantly bigger, if those fields at the terrace levels are large enough to grow useful amounts of food. This place has 180 stories (plus a basement?), with 175 of them virtually unexplored. “Tower” is just such an inadequate term; no skyscraper on earth could even begin to come close to it.
L: I got curious, so I looked up the tallest skyscrapers in the world. Currently the record is held by Burj Khalifa in the United Arab Emirates, which tops out at 163 floors and 828 meters tall! (If I didn’t know it was real, I would absolutely assume that this is an illustration from a scifi novel.)
A: That’s pretty tall, for sure. But it’s not a half-mile across at the bottom, and it’s got electric lighting. (I just made up that number, but it sounds good, right?) What really creeps me out, when I think of it in terms of square footage on each level, is all the darkness. There is no light in the interior, without the (presumed) power systems functioning. No. Light.
No wonder it’s mostly unexplored. With their current lack of infused spheres, they have to rely on flames of one sort or another. If you stumble and drop your lantern, you’re lost forever in the dark. Yeah, I wouldn’t be exploring, either.
On another note, Shallan seems to be able to instinctively read the strata, even though there’s no reason any two highprinces should have set up their quarters in the same layout:
“Don’t you see how wide those strata are?” she asked, pointing to the wall of the corridor. “It’s this way.”
I don’t know if it’s a Lightweaver thing or what, but she’s never wrong. I suspect it’s related to her ability to sense the wrongness in Urithiru, too—but I can’t even guess how it might be related.
Relationships & Romances
“Palona said you weren’t feeling well,” Adolin said […]. “Is it, um, girl stuff?”
[…]
“Why is it that every time a woman is feeling a little odd, men are so quick to blame her cycle?”
L: Let’s talk for a moment about “Girl Stuff,” as this section resulted in a bit of a heated debate amongst the beta readers. Props to Sanderson for actually talking about menstruation in a fantasy novel—often times natural biological functions like this are glossed over or ignored completely (especially menstruation because the natural bodily processes of ladies are ICKY and EW and who wants to talk about thaaaaaat ::end bitter sarcasm::), and I think it lends an air of realism to see characters discussing them. However, I (and some others) wasn’t a fan of how flippantly Shallan treats Adolin here. His initial comment, to me, came off as caring. If he’d been saying this demeaningly about her attitude and not about her feeling physically ill I would have totally understood Shallan’s reaction. Adolin’s not being a stereotypical male here and making a joke about it—he’s legitimately trying to discover what’s wrong. However, I suppose I have to give Shallan a little leeway considering the fact that she’s hung over. And young. It’s hard to remember sometimes that she’s only, what? Seventeen?
A: Yep. Seventeen. Hung over. Trying to find a balance between the ready flippancy she had used to keep her brothers’ minds off the horror of life (and which she also used to hide from her own pain) and the responsibility of the position she now holds. Throw in the confusion she’s creating by separating herself into multiple personalities, one of which is super-proper and another is tough and careless. Girl’s a mess. Which… doesn’t make me like her any better for her treatment of Adolin, unfortunately.
Oddly enough, I don’t recall seeing much of the beta-debate happening in the fan debates. Some thought it was really horrible of Adolin to simply assume that since she was “off” it must be “girl stuff,” while others thought it was pretty considerate of him. (His comment about the girl who had “girl stuff” four times in one month was pretty hilarious, though. Speaking of which, I wonder what their normal cycle is on Roshar: once a month, meaning roughly 50 days, or something nearer our roughly 28-day average? Inquiring minds want to know, for absolutely no good reason.)
“The Almighty gave us messy hair to prepare us for living with men.”
L: Sorry, Shallan, but this is just cringeworthy. How about having respect for your betrothed instead of lumping him in with stereotypes in an “ugh, MEN, am I right, ladies?” response?
Not to say that this makes her an unbelievable character to me. Not at all. I know people who do this all the time. It just makes me sad, because Adolin’s so obviously not a stereotypical Alethi male that treating him as such seems to me to be a disservice to him, and not a good foundation upon which to begin building this relationship.
A: Shallan frequently makes me cringe when she starts flinging words around without thinking about what she’s saying. Half the time, the stuff she says when she’s feeling a little defensive is stuff she clearly wouldn’t mean if she took two seconds to think about it. I guess there’s something to be said for parking-lot comebacks: at least you didn’t say something you thought was witty that really wasn’t?
L: However, all this said… Adolin doesn’t seem to mind as much as I do. So I guess… if it works for them, it works for them. It just rubs me the wrong way—I guess it’s a good thing I’m not in a relationship with her!
“Also,” Adolin said, “we have the strangest conversations.”
“It feels natural to have them with you.”
L: D’awwwwwwwwwwww.
“You sound like your father,” she said.
He paused, then looked away. “Nothing wrong with that.”
L: That pause is awfully suspicious. I think he’s thinking about who his father was in the past, here. He’s just not ready to talk about it with her yet, either because he doesn’t want to think about it, or because he doesn’t want to ruin his father’s reputation with his betrothed by bringing up his past. And this strengthens that theory:
“You are,” she said, pulling his arm tight. “You’re just like him, Adolin. Moral, just, and capable.”
He frowned.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
L: The question is… is Adolin doing this for Dalinar’s sake? Is he protecting his father by not disabusing Shallan of this notion, or is he really protecting himself, because he doesn’t want to think about those days? Does he not want Shallan to worry that he might turn out the same way?
A: Fascinating, Captain. I read that so differently. I mean, you’re right that Adolin knew some of what his father was back in the day, but he also believes (as his mother taught him) that Dalinar was the greatest soldier in all Alethkar or whatever she said.
L: Sometimes I wonder, though, whether or not he has suspicions. I mean… he’s not deaf. He must have heard at least some of the stories.
A: Sure, he knows some of it—he was on campaign with Dalinar part of the time, and I don’t think he was blind to the brutality of war or his father’s role as commander. But this is Alethkar, and war is considered the highest art. I don’t think he’d have seen it quite the way we do!
In any case, I read this pause as Adolin’s guilty conscience—not that he feels particularly guilty about killing Sadeas, but that he feels guilty for not being the man Dalinar thinks he is. He’s not ready to talk to Shallan about sounding like his father while failing to live up to his ideals.
L: I really wish we could get a glimpse into his head for this section, but as Shallan says,
“A relationship needs some measure of mystery.”
L: Same goes for characters in books! If we had all of our questions answered immediately, there’d be little reason to keep reading!
Bruised & Broken
“Did you know,” Ialai said, “that after whitespines make a kill, they will eat, then hide near the carcass? […] I used to wonder at this behavior until I realized the kill will attract scavengers, and the whitespine is not picky. The ones that come to feast on its leavings become another meal themselves.”
The implication of the conversation seemed clear to Shallan. Why have you returned to the scene of the kill, Kholin?
L: I’m going to put this discussion here, because despite what an utter snake Sadeas was, his wife quite clearly adored him and she’s in heavy grief. She’s on the defensive, and she’s lashing out—in this case, at entirely the right person. Adolin did kill her husband. She’s facing down his killer, and I wonder if she might not somehow sense that. I think that if Dalinar winds up publicly releasing the information that Adolin killed Sadeas, Ialai is almost certainly going to come after him—probably deviously, behind the scenes. She’s going to work day and night to destroy him utterly.
A: She may have some trouble with that, since she already left Urithiru in disgrace. It will depend on what friends & contacts she still has in Urithiru that can make trouble on her behalf—or if anyone actually cares any more, with a new Desolation staring them down.
It was interesting to note that Shallan wasn’t entirely convinced, thinking that she herself would have no problem making herself cry if it would strengthen her position. Given what we’ve seen of them, I think she really did care, though; they were truly a matched set. I’ll admit, it won’t bother me much if we don’t see any more out of that princedom for a while.
Diagrams & Dastardly Designs
Ghostbloods!
A: Oh, my stars. Where to even start with this? First there’s the shock of seeing Mraize posing as Ialai’s guard, and then the news that the Ghostbloods were “interested” in Torol and Ialai, but didn’t consider them good candidates for membership, as they’re “too wild a variable” with motives of their own. I thought this was odd, though:
[Ialai] and her husband were too wild of a variable for us to invite. Their motives are their own; I don’t think they align to those of anyone else, human or listener.”
A: What is that supposed to mean? I wouldn’t have expected any of the humans to have motives aligning with the listeners, so does he mean that they don’t align with Odium? Or… Ack. It makes my head hurt just to try to come up with possible meanings. HELP!!
L: Well, it doesn’t surprise me that Ialai and Sadeas were only in it for themselves, that’s for certain. Everything they did was self-serving. But reading between the lines, this does seem to imply that there are some humans out there who are already (or might eventually) align with the Listeners/Odium. Humans like… oh, I don’t know. Amaram. Or ::mutters curses:: Moash.
A: Speaking of muttering curses… Mraize does something here that drives me nuts, whether it’s in real life or fiction: without any actual authority, he orders Shallan to do something for the Ghostbloods that she’s already working on and would do in any case.
Secure Urithiru. Hunt the source of the darkness you feel, and expunge it. This is your task.
It reminds me of one of the times I wanted to smack Moiraine in The Wheel of Time, with her philosophy of “tell people to do the thing you know they were just about to do; they can’t reasonably argue against doing it, and it gets them in the habit of obeying you.” It’s so bloody calculating and manipulative, and IMO it’s counterproductive. I hate it when someone does that to me, and—unreasonable or not—I have a strong tendency to deliberately not do the thing, solely because they told me to.
I’m not sure if it’s better or worse that Mraize promises Shallan information about her brother Helaran, should she succeed in completing her task. (Of course, if she’d failed, she wouldn’t be in any position to wonder about Helaran anyway.)
“Morality is an axis that doesn’t interest us,” Mraise said calmly. “Only loyalty and power are relevant, for morality is as ephemeral as the changing weather. It depends upon the angle from which you view it.”
L: This is a lesson that Kaladin’s learning in his own set of chapters, and as creepy as it is to see it coming from Mraize in this context, I rather like seeing this mirroring. This seems to be a major theme of the book—morality as seen from different sides, and—of course—unity, and whether or not that’s even possible depending on the morality in question.
“Do you blame your wonderfully moral Blackthorn for what he did in war? The countless people he slaughtered?”
L: I find it interesting that Shallan didn’t think to question this. Does she know anything about the Alethi history, about Dalinar’s actions specifically? Or did Gavilar conveniently forget to have those things added to the history books?
“Urithiru must remain strong if we are to properly use the advent of the Voidbringers.”
“Use them?”
“Yes,” Mraize said. “This is a power we will control, but we must not let either side gain dominance yet.”
L: Dude. What are these guys planning?!
A: This is the kind of thing that makes me believe they aren’t any more concerned with Roshar itself than Hoid is—he of the “I’ll let it burn if I have to” motif. I suspect they couldn’t really care less about either humans or parsh on this world; they’re only concerned with their interstellar power play, whatever it is. Who’s taking bets that they’re associated with Bavadin? (FYI, that’s the Vessel of Autonomy, who appears to be sketchy as all get-out.)
Squires & Sidekicks
“You don’t need guards, maybe, but you do need an honor guard. Men to be honored by their position. It’s part of the rules we play by–you get to be someone important, they get to share in it.”
L: It goes deeper than societal rules, and I think Adolin recognizes that. It’s psychological. If someone you admire or who is higher in station than you proves that they trust and respect you by giving you more authority, you will be more likely to reciprocate that trust and respect. It’s one of the reasons so many people hate micro-managers—being such indicates a lack of trust that the people you’ve chosen to do their jobs are qualified to do so. This is a tenet of leadership which Adolin just seems to naturally understand, one which I wish so many of my old managers when I worked retail had been taught. You lift up those around you. Often, they’ll do a better job at what you set them to do because of it, and everyone rises together.
Adolin is teaching Shallan what he and Kaladin already instinctively know, and she’ll become a better Knight Radiant because of it down the line, when she realizes that she has her own set of squires.
A: It really is a joy to see her getting these lessons, and starting to act on them later in the book. (She doesn’t really get it yet, but the fact that she’ll try even when she doesn’t fully understand is something, too.) It’s a good reminder that for a lot of years now, she hasn’t seen much by way of good, mature leadership—the kind that would show you how this works. Both Adolin and Kaladin have had opportunity to observe good and bad leadership in action, and to practice it themselves. Shallan has had none of that, and now she’s going to hold a position where good leadership is essential. It’s a good thing she’s got Adolin to help her!
Flora & Fauna
A chicken. It was one of the stranger varieties, pure green and sleek, with a wicked beak. It looked much more like a predator than the bumbling things she’d seen sold in cages at markets.
L: Let’s talk about chickens, shall we? To help with the discussion, have a look at this helpful graphic created by Ross Newberry:
So, going by this super-scientific and extraordinarily helpful chart, I’d say that the type of chicken Mraize has is probably a Color Chicken. Alice, do you concur?
A: I concur. I don’t recall pompous chickens being all that colorful, anyway.
L: In all seriousness, in case you weren’t already aware, ALL birds in Roshar are known as chickens (except in Shinovar). Brandon had this to say about the subject:
“I wanted to indicate that the word for “bird” just spread through Roshar as “chicken” because those were the birds that they knew about.”
L: We’ll talk a little more about this particular chicken down in the Cosmere Connections section.
Tight Butts and Coconuts
“I’m an all-powerful, Shardblade-wielding pseudo-immortal, but nature still sends a friendly reminder every now and then to tell me I should be getting around to having children.”
“No mating,” Pattern buzzed softly on the wall.
L: Say what you will about Pattern, he’s dedicated to his new job.
A: Say what you will, I adore Pattern. He’s absolutely priceless.
Prestige is practically leaking from my nose these days, Adolin.
A: What? It made me giggle! (Besides, it’s preferable to the allergies that hit me today.)
Weighty Words
She held her breath so it wouldn’t puff out when she breathed, and … suppressed the Light. She could do that, she’d found. To prevent herself from glowing or drawing attention. She’d done that as a child, hadn’t she?
A: Little tidbits like this, emerging so quietly along the way, gave me such false hopes for learning more about Shallan’s early days, before the killing started. We still know hardly anything about the days when she was first bonding with Pattern, what they learned together, what fun games she played with him…
Motivations of Masterful Manipulators
“How is it,” Shallan said, “that I am still sleeping on the floor, while you have cots right here.”
“Are you a highprince?” Sebarial mumbled, not even opening his eyes.
“No, I’m a Knight Radiant, which I should think is higher.”
“I see,” he said, then groaned in pleasure at the masseuse’s touch, “and so you can pay to have a cot carried in from the warcamps? Or do you still rely on the stipend I give you?”
L: For starters, I love this. Every time Sebarial and his mistress show up I love them more. They simply don’t care what anyone else thinks—they do what they want and they love it, thank you very much. But secondly (and the reason this is in this section) is that I think they’re being very clever to keep Shallan indebted to them. Obviously they couldn’t have known this when they took her in, but now that they know that she’s a Knight Radiant, it’s very much in their interests to keep a Knight Radiant in their back pockets! Sebarial shows time and again how wise he is, from economics to politics to manipulating those close to him in order to ensure that the odds are still (and will continue to be) in his favor. He knows exactly which horse to back, and when. I hope it doesn’t eventually bite him in the ass…
A: It occurs to me that there’s an awkwardness here that I didn’t think about in the beta. Shallan has been getting infused spheres from Dalinar for the purposes of practicing. What happens when she’s drained them? Does she keep them? Trade them back to him for infused ones? Just return the dun ones and hope for more? In order to give her Stormlight to practice with, Dalinar also had to give her significant amounts of money. This could be a slight issue with having your money be the same object as your magic power source, in this specific context. Although Adolin does sort of address it:
“You know, when my father explained that good relationships required investment, I don’t think this is what he meant.”
Cosmere Connections
L: Well, we have a WoB that Mraize’s chicken is an Aviar from Sixth of the Dusk. What powers did the Aviar have, again? It’s been so long since I read that one that I’ve quite forgotten. Wasn’t it some sort of telepathy?
A: Yes, it’s sort of telepathy. There were different kinds of birds: some of them could shield your thoughts from telepathic predators; some of them could show you places you might die (but not necessarily why). It’s hinted that there are other abilities as well, but we haven’t seen them yet. It’s really hard to guess what Mraize’s chicken’s ability is; it seems to react to Shallan’s anger with some agitation, but that’s all we get.
L: And the bigger question… how the heck did Mraize get it?! Is he world-hopping himself, or did he buy it from someone who did?
A: If only we knew! I suspect he is a world-hopper, but I don’t have much confidence that he’s good enough to survive a visit to First of the Sun, much less to leave again with a captive Aviar. Since their abilities depend on the young Aviar actually living in a specific place for some length of time, it has to have been captured live on the planet, though. So… either he’s better than I thought, or he got it from someone with an unparalleled ability to survive on Patji.
L: Maybe that’s where he got all those scars on his face.
Quality Quotations
Besides, here, looking too clean will get you mocked. You can’t be mistaken for a Kholin.”
* * *
“My mother always said she thought you were clever. She admired you, and wished she had your wit. Yet here, I see no proof of that.”
A: Oh, snap!
“His name is Meridas Amaram. I believe you know him.”
L: Boooooo. Hissssss. If there’s one person I hated more than Sadeas (before the end of Part 3 when Moash took the hate-crown), it’s this d-bag.
A: It be a hatefest up in here. He’s such scum. Is it something in the water up there?
“Stormwall spotted in New Natanan. The highstorms. They’ve returned.”
A: And no more need to worry about investing in relationships—at least not quite the same way!
A: Well, thar she blows. Join us in the comments now, and come back next week for Chapter 23, another short Kaladin episode, and 24, in which Dalinar deals with both politics and awakening memories.
L: Alice is busy next week, so we’ll be pulling in “official” Stormwarden, Rosharian Ornithologist, and fellow beta-reader Ross Newberry to help out.
Alice is enjoying the Legion gamma read—that’s some good storytelling—and hoping to finish it before her vacation preparations have to kick in. Watch for a new reread participant next week!
Lyndsey is finally done with conventions and Renaissance Faires… which means she’s got a ton of free time to really get cracking on editing her own novels. If you’re an aspiring author, a cosplayer, or just like geeky content, follow her work on Facebook or her website.
Ok, so I definitely still thought it was Jasnah writing the epigraphs at this point and somehow “I’m not a philosopher” didn’t convince me I was wrong. How dense can you get?
Just a note, one of the two chapter heading graphics shown above is not correct given the chapters you’re discussing.
The title pictures are for 20 and 21 not 21 and 22.
I feel it necessary to point out that having goals inline with the listeners does not necessarily mean their goals are inline with Odium. Though linked in some ways, Odium and the listeners are two distinct and different entities.
Is it really a question if Mraize is a world-hopper? I thought it was pretty obvious from Shallan’s first meeting with the group that they’re all world-hoppers.
Oh more comments later, but Adolin reacting negatively about Shallan comparing him to Dalinar is not about Dalinar’s past, it is about Adolin! Adolin believes he doesn’t meet up to his father’s expectations: he thinks he is the lesser man. He doesn’t think he is as capable as Dalinar, as moral as Dalinar nor as just as Dalinar.
I must thus disagree, none of this conversation is about Dalinar’s past: it is all about Adolin and how he feels in his relationship with Dalinar. Adolin holds absolutely no grudges against Dalinar for his past and he doesn’t know about the Rift. He genuinely believes his father would have saved he Rift had he not been grieving for his dead wife.
Like Shallan always says: Oh Adolin…
@2 and 3: Thanks–we’ll update the images ASAP!
I think @6 gepeto is on the money with this one. Adolin is currently beating himself up about failing to live up to the codes, as embodied by present Dalinar.
I liked the way Adolin dropped the courtesy and shot strait from the hip with Ialai. Also, Sebarial is my favorite out of all the High Princes, he just keeps getting better!
“You know, when my father explained that good relationships required investment, I don’t think this is what he meant.”
Magic? :eyes:
So two comments.
First about money changing dun spheres for infused. Later when Kaladin is training his squires, he goes to the quarter master to requisition emerald broams for stormlight to train them. The quarter master remarks how odd it is, but Kaladin jokes about being back with the used ones for more.
Second, I feel it was confirmed Mraize is a world hopper considering near the end of the book, his washerwoman was cleaning aether out of his pants. Aether of Night is a unpublished book that takes place on another planet. Unless Mraize is loaning out his pants, I think it is safe to say he has been world hopping lol.
@8: Yep. I think this definitely about how Adolin feels next to his father and how he doesn’t believe he is up to his father’s standards. This is pretty much what his narrative was about in OB.
On Adolin and his father’s past: I felt the narrative suggested Adolin does not know the extend of his father’s barbary. Oh he is not an idiot, he knows his father was a warlord, but he was told his was fighting the “bad guys”. Dalinar is the “good guy”, not the aggressor, not the conqueror. The worst actions from the Blackthorn were certainly not spoken of or, at least, told in a heroic way as history is always written by the victors. We saw how Gavilar hid the truth of what happened at the Rift…
So how much Adolin does actually know? He knows his father is a soldier, a “true soldier”, an accomplished military leader and he won many victories for Alethkar. He’s not an idiot, he’s been to war (though he never killed humans before Sadeas), he knows what war looks like, but he does not think of his father as a man who unjustly killed innocents. He thinks of his father as the Greatest Man Alive. A God.
He later thinks his father became a drunk because he missed Evi so much, he believes Dalinar was overcome by grief and, more importantly, Adolin does NOT know about the Rift. What version of the story was Adolin told, we do not know, but he do tell us HIS version of the event later in OB: his mother was Abducted by Rebels and Brutally Killed, then Big Bad Sadeas burned the Rift and God-Like Pure Dalinar couldn’t stop him as he was Injured and Overcome with Grief.
How much of his hate towards Sadeas come from thinking he is the man who burned the Rift? Some commented on how illogical it was for Adolin to hate Sadeas so much early in WoK as he hadn’t done much, yet. Could this be it?
On the matter of Ialai: Count me into the bandwagon of those believing she is not done yet. Alethkar was built by backstabbers and warlords: can we reasonably believe Ialai is going to allow the murder of her husband go unpunished just because there is a Desolation? Of course not! Is she without agency now she lost her army and has retreated to her lands? Of course not! She has her assassins, her intel on Dalinar and she still has her wits. All she needs are… allies.
Where may she get them? Let’s look West… The Iriali Queen wants a given Plate back, a Plate owned by none other than Adolin, a boy Ialai detests. The Skybreakers are fighting for the Fused now. Adolin, unlike his father, did break the law. He did kill a Highprince… He’s the perfect victim! He’s the perfect way to harm Dalinar. And wasn’t it the plan back in WoR? Hurt Adolin to hurt Dalinar? Take out the son?
I mean, if Brandon wants to write Ialai getting her revenge and, by the branch, give Adolin some turmoil, here’s our narrative! This would just make the Maya arc more powerful is Adolin really comes across as having a real hardship.
Feel free to disagree :-)
Ooh, these chapters! I’m pretty sure this is about where I first commented in the early chapter releases and this story inspired my choice of name – not that I enact the strategy ( I suppose to do that as a commenter would turn one into a troll (double-oooh, when Roshar gets the internet will commenters who just try to bait people be known as whitespines?)), but that I now had whitespines on the brain.
Anyway, I agree with Gepeto and Alice on Adolin’s thoughts and pauses related to Dalinar.
I’m also with Lyndsey that Sebarial and his mistress are awesome. Definitely look out for themselves, but I do think they have good intentions deep down and are loyal.
Regarding the chicken: When I first read this, I pictured it as a “color chicken”, and thought maybe it really was just a parrot. But, reading the description again here, and now knowing it is an aviar, I picture it as looking more falcon-like. As for how he got it, if I understand the timeline – that Sixth of the Dusk is (one of?) the most last books chronologically, Sixth and the current state of Patji haven’t even happened yet. In fact, based off of Hoid’s letters to other shards, it sounds like Patji is the latest manifestation/avatar of Autonomy. So, maybe Mraize or someone from the group got there right away and were some of the first to discover aviars in the first place – maybe even the defenses were still in the development phase.That gives extra weight to the phrase back from Autonomy about how they had prepared “tests” for Hoid should he visit. Since the Ghostbloods have gotten to Patji so quickly does give some support to Alice’s idea that they are linked to Bavadin.
Anyway… fun chapters.
@13 whitespine
I agree, I like Alice’s thought about Autonomy being linked with the Ghostbloods. They let their agents act for the most part autonomously (lol did not use that word intentionally). They seem to act in the background and not pick any side. It might not even be Bavadin as we know of her that is leading them. It could be one of her avatars acting alone.
I agree that the ghostbloods are likely associated with Autonomy – and I think Mraize having an aviar (as well as sand from Taldain) is one of the best pieces of evidence for this. Both artifacts require world hopping into very difficult-to-get places – the Aviar because Patji will kill you, the sand because Taldain is apparently so effectively blockaded that Khriss has trouble getting back there.
Since Mraize has these things, that suggests he might have permission to visit these worlds. And from Mistborn era 2, we have seen that (likely) Autonomy is willing to mess with other worlds.
There is a WoB somewhere that Mraize has been offworld “under close supervision.”
As for his working for Bavadin, I continue to think that he’s named after Rayse. You know, Odium’s Vessel’s name? (The planet Braize is almost certainly named after Rayse, yes?)
Of course his name could translate as anything from “Son of Rayse” to “Nemesis of Rayse”.
Re: Mraize, no one is saying he’s not a world-hopper, though it isn’t yet confirmed that he is. He is, however, confirmed to be Thaylen, so he would be the first current-era Rosharan-born world-hopper we know of. And of course, it’s eminently clear that Iyatil is not Rosharan. (We know virtually nothing about any other Ghostbloods.) The first question, not yet answered, is whether the collection of off-world stuff was obtained by Mraize personally, or by others. We don’t even know that it belongs to him – we just know that he has access to it. The second question is how he obtained an Aviar from a place where the perpendicularity is located in such a hostile environment. Khriss noted, presumably many years after this, that none of the expeditions from Silverlight had ever returned from there, and they would be expert world-hoppers. So is Mraize that good? Or that lucky? Or did he get it from someone else?
@16 – Correct, Carl. Not sure why I didn’t just look up a WoB!
@17 Wetlandernw
So……you are of the opinion Mraize lends his pants out for others to wear when they worldhop? lol
edited added afterwards
@18 Austin
Thanks for the confirmation!
Chapter 22 also foreshadows another darkness within: Amaram ingesting the crystal containing Yelig-nar. Darkness within literally applies to Amaram after he ingests the crystal.
Alice and Lyndsey: You only gave us one of the Epigraphs (Not sure which chapter you quoted about the author of OB being no storyteller).
That quote is ironic considering the author of the RL OB (as opposed to the Roshar book) is a storyteller. Telling a story is exactly what Brandon is doing when he writes his novels, including OB.
I also liked Shallan’s comment that her great powers could not stop her period. It shows once again that Stormlight cannot cure what the user understands to be something normal and not foreign. This is in line with the Stormlight rejecting the tattoo Kaladin got in WoR. He was not ready to accept the slave brands are not a natural part of him. As of the end of OB, I think Kaladin would still believe those slave brands are a natural part of him.
The Rishi part of the continent aligned fairly easily with Odium. They are humans. I believe they were close to aligning with them at this point in the story.
Thanks for reading my musings.
AndrewHB
aka the musespren
@17 Wetlandernw, @18 Austin
Isn’t there a WOB that implies that his babsk (Iyatil) is from Silverlight? She also has the carapace mask so I assumed that she was a South Scandrian. Which is even more confusing because I think Mistborn Era 2 is just before this?
I would love for there to be a Worldhopper novel as soon as possible.
@21 Yeah, Iyatil was born in Silverlight. The original WoB about her birthplace, at JordanCon 2016, was what gave us the info to speculate about Silverlight’s existence in the first place:
Play/Pause
Questioner
Obviously the world covers different planets, but most people on all the individual planets don’t know about the other planets. Is there a planet within the cosmere where worldhopping is common knowledge?
Brandon Sanderson
Is there a planet in the cosmere where worldhopping is common knowledge. Um… it’s not a planet.
Bystander
It’s a space station? *laughter* That’s no moon!
Brandon Sanderson
That’s not as far off as people laughing think that it is. *laughter* It’s not a space station, it’s not that futuristic, but there is a place in the cosmere where a lot of worldhoppers have settled, is where Iyatil is from, even though her ethnicity is not from there.
wingracer @@.-@ – “…having goals inline with the listeners does not necessarily mean their goals are inline with Odium. Though linked in some ways, Odium and the listeners are two distinct and different entities.”
Obviously their goals were different, considering how assiduously the listeners avoided anything remotely connected with Odium for centuries. The point was not, however, what we know about the listeners’ goals or Odium’s goals. The point was, what did Mraize mean? Why would he comment that a couple of humans’ motives might not align with the listeners’? Why should they? Does he think the listeners were aligned with Odium? Does he think the Sadeas couple’s motives would align with Odium, since they don’t align with other humans or listeners? It just seems such an odd comment that I can’t help wonder what he meant. He’s far more Cosmere-aware than most of the characters in SA, so what is he thinking? And, of course, whose goals are the Ghostbloods aligned with?
calyx @15 – Good point about Mraize (sorry I didn’t see this before I posted @17). If he/the Ghostbloods are associated with Bavadin, that would explain their ability to obtain things from world associated with her but noted as being extremely difficult or dangerous to access. Now I’m not sure if I’d made that connection in my sleep-fogged brain and forgot to line it out, or if I missed it completely even though I mentioned both the theory and the facts… but I think it’s the latter. I theorized the connection with Bavadin as being the Shard most likely to have agents on Roshar, and I questioned Mraize’s ability to hop to certain worlds, but I don’t think I connected the fact that those worlds (and maybe the one from Aether, too, who knows?) are under Bavadin’s influence. Good catch.
scath @19 – “So……you are of the opinion Mraize lends his pants out for others to wear when they worldhop?”
Stop putting words in my mouth. That’s not what I said – or implied – at all. Having access to the things in that collection doesn’t necessarily mean he went to those worlds. For example, Khriss can’t even figure out how to find Yolen, so I doubt Mraize was able to simply go there and grab that “branch of a tree with writing on it.” I’m of the opinion that someone(s) has collected a bunch of artifacts, and that Mraize has access to that collection. Mraize may or may not be the someone, or one of the someones, who did the collecting.
Andrew @20 – We combined the two epigraphs into one paragraph. The first sentence is from Ch. 21, and the second from Ch. 22.
I was pretty ticked off to read that Stormlight doesn’t help with cramps. Thanks, useless magic!
That Birds of Roshar chart is pretty funny, I think I’ll share it with my fellow Sanderfans .
@23 Wetlandernw
I posted earlier this
11 Scath So two comments.
First about money changing dun spheres for infused. Later when Kaladin is training his squires, he goes to the quarter master to requisition emerald broams for stormlight to train them. The quarter master remarks how odd it is, but Kaladin jokes about being back with the used ones for more.
Second, I feel it was confirmed Mraize is a world hopper considering near the end of the book, his washerwoman was cleaning aether out of his pants. Aether of Night is a unpublished book that takes place on another planet. Unless Mraize is loaning out his pants, I think it is safe to say he has been world hopping lol.
You said in your post we do not have proof that he didn’t have other people get these objects for him. His pants had aether stains. I was making the joke that unless you think he loaned out his pants, then he went himself at least to that planet. You said again we have no proof he went himself, so I made the joke that I guess you believe he lends out his pants. So I wasn’t putting words in your mouth. The only thing I can think of is you missed my earlier post. I hope that clarified things.
@23
Too late, its canon now. WOA from the Oathbringer Reread May 31, 2018 gave us this little tidbit:
Questioner:
Is Mraize a worldhopper?
Alice Arneson:
While Mraize himself is not a worldhopper, he does have special worldhopping pants that he loans out to others that enable them to travel throughout the Cosmere.
Questioner:
Do the pants have to fit the person traveling? And what size are they?
Alice Arneson:
I am going to have to RAFO that one.
@26 Stormy
LOL, maybe they are awakened pants. Is this confirmation of our first lifeless worldhopper?
(this is all meant in fun, and not to be construed as mocking. Hopefully it is taken in that light)
@26, 27 – I think you guys are missing Alice’s point. Mraize has access to a collection of off-world stuff. He could have had an aether mishap from handling it in the collection. It’s like, someone brought me ketchup from Germany and I spilled some on my pants. It doesn’t mean I’ve been to Germany.
Of course, this is all moot anyways, as a WoB confirms that Mraize is a worldhopper.
@28 Austin
Considering how they were cataloged, handled, how Mraize referred to his pants, and how Mem mentioned Mraize gallivanting, I doubt that was the case, but as you said this is all moot. I had not intended my post to be taken in that light so I will drop it.
edit actually no, I know I am being stubborn but I do have one more thing to say
“Oil stains were challenging enough, but this man had gotten blood on the same spot.”
Unless he cut himself, or was killing someone while handling the collection, he did not spill it on himself.
So good to see the aviar theory confirmed :) I really am picking up much more things than I used to.
I really liked how Adolin answered to Ialai’s accusations about Dalinar, at some point, you have to put your foot down (though what he said about Evi admiring Ialai made me a bit sad for her, especially considering the flashback of the subtle art of diplomacy). And I appreciate his insightfulness with the guards, and some other things (Deeli, you were so busted!)
@23, 26, 28
My bad. I apologize if that came off as mocking, mean-spirited, or insulting. I understood that Alice was saying there are many ways he could have come to have that collection and there are many ways he could end up with Aether on his pants other than actually traveling their himself.
I was simply tickled by the idea of world hopping pants and decided it would be funny to pretend Alice was positing that fact in the form of the earlier WOBs. I just forget that people aren’t listening to my train of thought and that sarcasm needs to be tagged. Mea Culpa!
I am so glad that Amaram is a goner. Every time he’s shown up it’s been a bad day for one of our heroes. Of course Moash has taken the crown and appears to have more staying power. Of course no one said things would be easy…
I agree with Gepeto; Ialai is going to be a problem later. To add my 2 pennies, Brandon goes out of his way to illustrate on multiple occasions that she’s dangerous and cunning. The 4 on 1 duel was her scheme; without Radient intervention Taravanginan would be running the world right now. She got clowned in OB but I cannot see her finished just yet. She still lives after all.
For Cosmere considerations, just how buddy-buddy are Rayse and Badvadin? Seems to me that they both want the same thing but it strikes me that the conflict will arise when it comes time to determine who will be first on the Org chart. And if there’s a force strong enough to oppose Adonolasium, the way they operate is sure to fail. Even if everything goes according to plan and one of them ends up at the top of the dung heap, they would have done it while leaving a lot of power scattered to the winds. Seems like the force that could stand up to a full strength Adonolasium would have no problem at all smashing a shard alone, no matter how viscous its Intent.
@32: Ialai was repetitively described as cunning, highly intelligent and dangerous. We however saw none of this in the books. Understandably, she was grieving her Torol in OB. No matter what those may have been, they did love each other. Sadeas finding Ialai’s intelligence and cunning more alluring than a pretty face was his one redeeming quality.
Mraize, whoever he may be, did have an interest in Ialai. This fact alone tells me we shouldn’t forget Ialai nor dismiss her because she did the walk of shame. There is nothing more dangerous than a bruised ego. Mixed a bruised ego and a broken heart into a cunning dangerous woman and we have the perfect recipe for a not to be dismissed opponent.
On the side note, this is twice Adolin is being compared to a Whitespine.
On the second side note, I didn’t think much of Adolin mentioning Shallan’s woman issues, but I do agree she is kind of manhandling him in there… It makes me wonder how their relationship will grow as it’s pretty obvious to me: she’s the boss. Not him.
Adolin, strange conversations are a hazard of living in a Brandon Sanderson’s story. Your conversations with Shallan tend to be especially weird, though. I enjoy them and envy you. I miss my college friends, and miss listening to them discuss fractal monkeys and space whales or argue over whether “sinusoidal” is an everyday word.
Given Evi’s frustrated desire to be more like Alethi women, I can believe that she admired Ialai’s perceived intelligence and social ease.
*giggling at the discussion of worldhopping pants* What? Pants are inherently amusing to me.
Mraize probably doesn’t identify with the Rosharan humans, he just sees them and the listeners as groups he wants to play against each other. Sadeas doesn’t care about the wellbeing of humans (or listeners) either, just about his own power.
How is a month defined in a world with multiple moons?
birgit – Heh. I never thought about that before, but there’s a pretty straightforward answer: Ten.
Months aren’t based on moon cycles – I’m not even 100% sure the moons change much. IIRC, there’s “something odd” about them. (I’ll go look that up in a minute.) But months are based on ten five-day weeks, regardless of moons. The fact that the natural cycle of Weepings works out to exactly 1000 (or 500, depending on how you look at it) is presumably an artifact of Adonalsium having fun playing when he created Roshar. There are a number of things that are odd about this joint, and everything Brandon has said about them amounts to “Adonalsium did it that way on purpose.”
OK, I am of 2 minds about Sanderson bringing up menstruation – because on the one hand, yea, it is good to see stuff like that aknowledged. But on the other, it makes zero sense that stormlight wouldn’t help with menstrual cramps, because some women don’t even have them, while most others don’t have them every time, so why would they be part of one’s intrinsic identity?
It is all part and parcel of fictional tradition where magical healing can perfectly restore one from any wounds, no matter how extensive and deadly and even bring people back from actual death, but is no help where normal illnesses or childbirth are concerned – largely for the ease of fridging, creating drama or removing obstacles that don’t warrant spectacular fights from the the hero’s path to greatness… sigh.
This also applies to said healing not counter-acting aging, which it really should if it is as unlimited as portrayed. After all, we now know that there is no hard limit on cell divisions as used to believed previously, due to persistence of stem cells. So, aging is nothing more than gradual accumulation of damage, which magical healing should be able to remove. Or, if there are limits to magical healing – in that it can only restore so much, then they should apply to wounds and aging both and eventually be reached. I.e. somebody who repeatedly heals from mortal wounds should run out at some point and die, whereas somebody careful could apply all that healing to anti-aging and run out and die centuries later. Ahem.
Yes, I know that Sanderson crafted cosmeric laws that prevent most of his magical humans with relevant abilities from having extended life-spans that they logically should posess – but it never felt persuasive to me.
On to the foolishness of Adolin and Shallan believing that they don’t _really_ need bodyguards. Which, yes, he also does and stated so in WoR repeatedly. Ranged weapons exist, people! Even Radiants are at risk, when they are low on stormlight, leave alone normal shardbearers, and you have lots of potential enemies and consequently the need for somebody to guard your backs. Yes, Adolin is right about the contract with subordinates where they need to feel included and do things that matter, but he shouldn’t see it as just a matter of upholding their morale.
I also agree that he suffers from a major inferiority complex and a sense of guilt when Shallan compares him with Dalinar, here.
Mraize – I don’t really believe him that Ialai isn’t connected to the Ghostbloods in some way. Why would she allow some dude, who only occasionally puts an appearance, to play her bodyguard during 2 momentuous meetings in OB? And to also carry a “chicken” on his shoulder on this occasion? As somebody with an extensive spy and assassin network, Ialai knows better than anyone, that you should only keep people whom your know through and through and trust in your personal guard. And there is no way that Mraize, who, as we learn in a later chapter, gallivanates all around Roshar on a regular basis, could have convinced Ialai of being some old family retainer.
Speaking of Mraize’s Aviar and the accessibility of Autonomy’s worlds – does her having multiple avatars allow her to have multiple perpendicularities, or is she still restricted to just 1? And in the latter case, was “closing” of Taldain a by-product of her transferring the perpendicularity to the First of the Sun? Also, I need to point out that it should be much easier for a world-hopper to obtain an Aviar than for an inhabitant of that world, because isn’t the perpendicularity where all the young Aviar obtain their magical parasite worms? And isn’t it pretty safe there? So, ducking in, nabbing an Aviar and leaving shouldn’t be much of a problem. It is likely when the expeditions tried to leave the immediate vicinity, where their minds were shielded by all the Aviar, that they perished.
Towards the end of OB we already have some idea about what Ghostbloods want to gain from the balance of forces, BTW – a Unmade of their own, for one. They are likely be working for Bavadin, but I wouldn’t discount a possibility that a certain character from the Mistborn sequence could be involved with them or indeed be their founder. I can’t wait to see if Thaidakar wears and eye-patch ;).
@38: You raise a fair point.
Why wouldn’t stormlight take care of menstrual cramps when it can basically heal anyone from the most dire wounds within seconds without leaving any sequels? Menstrual cramps are not part of any woman’s identity, of this I am utterly convinced (no women in their right state of mind believes they deserve those cramps nor they are part of their core being: they generally went them to be gone and to never come back), and can often be taken care of with ipuprofen. For those unlucky ones where this wouldn’t work, there are other pills. More over, it isn’t rare for the same woman to experience cramps during one period of time in her life and not in another. Hence, young women tend to have them, but older women tend not to have them, mind this isn’t a firm rule, but the idea cramps are perpetual and are part of a woman’s core self is wrong. If there is one thing which isn’t stable throughout life-span, it is menstrual cycles.
Is this a mistep because Brandon liked the flow of the conversation in between Adolin and Shallan? Or because he believes cramps are part of a natural phenomenon which cannot be stopped, same as hair growth?
I’ll admit I worry about the near invincibility stormlight is providing and how easy it is to heal anyone with regrowth. It is probably why I was pleased Renarin’s healing wasn’t complete, when he heals Adolin during the thunderclast fighting scene, as this gave me hope it wasn’t so powerful risk is now gone.
On Adolin and his inferiority complex: It comes back a few times within OB. Twice he compares himself unfavorably to the concept of “true soldier”, always considering he misses the mark, believing he is not it. Later, he also thinks of himself as useless as the world now needs generals and leaders, not duelists: he fails to acknowledge he’s actually a better leader than most and, at the specific moment where he voices those thoughts, much better than Kaladin.
While this was hinted on in WoR, not many readers caught on it. I wonder, did it come up as a surprise to some? And how does this change the perception readers previously had of Adolin? Prior to OB, it was generally accepted Renarin was the brother who didn’t think much of himself. In OB we find out his real issues are not exactly it and it is in fact Adolin who thinks he isn’t worth much. Who would have thought? I did… but it wasn’t an argument which was a crowd pleaser.
As a person with a uterus, I found the “lady time” conversation actually really natural. He is trying to be understanding, but is awkward and embarrassed, definitely sweet. Have known men just like this. She feels like crap, and probably part of her isn’t in complete control of her mouth, but she was able to keep from being completely cruel about it (which a part of her probably wanted to be). This is a regular part of my cycle.
As for Stormlight and cramps…cramps aren’t an illness or an injury. It’s the body working hard and there’s really nothing for the Stormlight to “fix”. The pain is the muscles in the abdomen and lower back contracting to help shed the uterus lining. Stormlight would have to act like an analgesic or muscle relaxer in order to do anything for the cramps.
Maybe someone with the intimate knowledge of the biological system and symptoms might be able to visualize enough to get Stormlight to have an effect against something like cramps, but so far it seems that healing is more of a general, “let the Stormlight flow and fix what is broken” sort of thing.
That may also account for Kal’s brand scars too. Less of “the brands feel like they are part of him” and more mechanical…the brand scars are intact, and are “working as intended” so there is nothing to fix. If he had had access and ability with Stormlight when he was branded, that probably could have been healed.
Re: menstrual cramps – It’s worth noting that Shallan never says that she can’t fix cramps with Stormlight when they come – just that she can’t prevent them from coming. We don’t even know if she’s correct that far; Jasnah would be a better source of information. Given Shallan’s surprise when Stormlight fixed her drunkenness, combined with the fact that she really hasn’t been consciously self-healing all that long, it’s a fair guess that she may not even have tried to stop cramps. There’s an even stronger probability that it’s never occurred to her to wonder if she could manipulate her cycle – but I’ll bet Jasnah has thought about it by now.
On Roshar, where ibuprofen and chemical contraception are not readily available, I also think it’s a stretch to say that no woman would consider cramps as part of her identity. Menstruation is normally part of being a woman, and for someone who regularly gets cramps, it could easily be viewed as part and parcel of her cycle.
Of course, if it is possible, I would expect that with time, some female Radiant or squire will use Stormlight to get rid of her cramps, either intentionally or accidentally (like Shallan with the alcohol). From there it would become standard practice. So far, though, Sanderson has not allowed Investiture to prevent natural maturation (c.f. Lift), and I think that’s deliberate. He doesn’t want his magic-users to be able to live forever; aside from how boring it would get, there are always limits to magic in his worlds. So far, obviously, we haven’t seen anyone dying of old age – but that’s because they usually die by violence before they get that far. (Possible exception would be Elantris – I don’t remember how Elantrians aged when everything was working right.) It will be interesting to see what he does with someone like Dalinar, who comes to his magic-use as one who’s already aging: will he simply stop aging? Does he see himself as aging, and so he’ll continue to age? Or is there something to the human process of maturing that cannot be stopped by magic? We’ll probably see this addressed at some point.
#36, @birgit writes: “… Mraize probably doesn’t identify with the Rosharan humans …”
Is it worth mentioning that Mraize is a Rosharan “human”? He’s Thaylen.
I would also like to raise the possibility that Shallan is simply wrong about menstrual cramps. She doesn’t know everything about Stormlight (or the female reproductive cycle). Maybe she just has to do something specific to heal them.
Mraize was born on Roshar, but unlike most Rosharans he knows about other worlds and visited some of them. He probably sees himself as something better than the ignorant locals, even though he once was one of them. The worldhoppers are now his people, and he sees himself as part of a bigger world, where the fate of one planet isn’t that important. If Roshar is damaged by the war against Odium he can go elsewhere.
@39 You wrote, “(no women in their right state of mind believes they deserve those cramps nor they are part of their core being: they generally went them to be gone and to never come back),”
I don’t know if Shallan qualifies as a woman in her right state of mind.
John @44 – Point.
Except Shallan is not crazy… Twice Brandon has commented on Shallan and twice he confirmed she is neither crazy nor having any sort of mental illness nor disorder. Twice he confirmed what is happening with Veil/Radiant is purely magical.
My interpretation is Shallan’s magic allows her to appear as if she were someone else to other people and, as a result, other people treat her as if she were different. When she is Veil, people think Veil is a real person and they treat her according to what they know of Veil. Hence the fake background and skills, so long as Shallan can fake them realistically enough, become real because others think them real, not because they are.
Shallan is not crazy, most sane people would more or less sink into “fake” personas they make had they the ability to make other people really see those “fakes” as “different people”.
There is a local TV series which broached exactly this topic: when everyone believes you are someone else, it is terribly easy to start thinking you can be this someone else, forever, especially if this someone else has a “more inviting” life than your “real one”.
It is all pretty weird, but by all means Shallan is not crazy.
Has there been anything in the book that might lead us to believe that Hoid and the Ghostbloods are enemies? Or allies? They both have ambitions and plans beyond Roshare. They both interact with Shallan, though in very different ways. They are both trying to gain power for a battle of some sort.
I felt that Mraize being with Iali and seeming a rather a low level soldier was not believable if they have no other connection. Wouldn’t the wife of a high prince have what amounts to a Royal Guard the same as Dalinar?
I think she is still dangerous. Her teams of spies and assassins will be with her as long as she has money.
For me, the most hindering and irritating part of menstruation isn’t the cramps, which I get mildly, but the bleeding. Before I started on the Pill to regulate my periods, they were very irregular and very heavy. In a world (and some parts of our world) without tampons or hormonal medication, this has to be much more of a hassle and a restriction on what actvities a person can/wants to do. So when I hear the euphemism “girl stuff” used in this way, I don’t automatically think of cramps, though that is what’s discussed in this chapter.
Just like Dalinar selected the guards he trusted to protect Elhokar, without any real say / input on Elhokar’s part, you could say that Mraize could have been placed as a guard for Iali by someone she likewise trusted.
Seems like a more plausible reason for Mraize being her guard and addresses some of the concerns people have brought up (how does he get close to her if he is always off doing other things, etc…).
The real question then is who has that level of trust from Iali and what is the relationship between that person and Mraize / the Ghostbloods?
@Gepeto
Sorry, Shallan is crazy, or at the very least deeply confused. If I recall correctly the WOB you are referencing, Brandon doesn’t say she isn’t crazy, just that she isn’t suffering from Disassociative Identity Disorder as defined by the DSM-IV handbook.Yes, a part of her problems are magically induced or magically aided, but psychosis is there. I agree that sometimes it is awfully tempting to sink into a personality you create for yourself and that isn’t necessarily crazy. I would argue that it is crazy to be confused about which personality is the real one as Shallan does several times throughout OB. When she loses track of who is running the show, that indicates a problem to me. When she notes that without these made up personas she would surely go catatonic that indicates a problem to me. Several times during the course of OB she displays behavior that points to illness. She is functional and is seen to be sane to any outside observer, but even that is an act. Shallan is mentally ill; she’s coming out of her downward spiral at the end of OB but she does have issues and continues to have issues.
@50: It wasn’t just this WoB, here is what another reader had to report on his conversation with Brandon:
A couple quick notes here, I actually had a short conversation with Brandon on this when I got my copy of Oathbringer signed. I’m also a psychology student specializing in disorders. He told me he consults with several people who are well versed in psychology when he tries to portray anything along these lines. He did say (and this goes along with other statements already made) that his intention was not to have Shallan diagnosed with DID like Kaladin is with Depression. He did take some ideas from the disorder to use in the story, but he didn’t intend for her to be set into a specific mental illness category. Like we said before, Brandon’s focus was mainly on the magical consequences, which makes her case weird anyways.
Just thought I’d add that since I talked to Brandon about it specifically.
Hence, this is twice Brandon is confirming Shallan is not having a mental illness and, as such, is definitely not crazy nor having a psychosis. And I think just pretending to be other people and immersing yourself so deeply into their “fake life” can be so alluring the lines in between “make-believe” and “reality” can easily get murky, especially for someone having such strong reasons to be someone else as Shallan. I albeit do not believe she is anywhere near crazy nor mentally ill, she has trauma, this is sure, but she isn’t on some sort of spectrum disorder.
I’ll push it even further and I will theorize the reason why Lightweavers have truths and not oaths is to specifically prevent what Shallan nearly does. When your magical powers are such you can be anyone you want, you can have anyone view you as you see fit, you can re-invent your life at leisure because you have infinite number of perfect masks you can put onto your face, you can manipulate your voice…, well when you have those abilities, the temptation to just “make a persona” for each situation, each need, each life must be horribly tempting. Losing yourself into them must be terribly easy… Remember how Pattern is praising Shallan for her disguises early on? Readers ranted he was encouraging a negative habit, but no. This is what Lightweavers do: they play with reality, they alter it, they make lies become real and because such are their powers, the one thing which matters the most, to them, are not oaths, but truths. Truths because you cannot forget who you are, you have to stay true to yourself, no matter who’s face you are wearing.
I disagree Shallan would go catatonic if she didn’t have her personalities. It isn’t how it happens in the narrative… She spoke the truth and she isn’t catatonic. She can operate the Oathgate, she is functional even if it is a hard pill to swallow. Early on, she is practicing Veil, adjusting her voice. Later, she is adding things to her backstory: she makes it up as she goes! But when she does her investigation while being Veil, she felt… control. Or something, maybe it wasn’t control, but she liked it. Being Veil slowly becomes more and more seducing to her and she reaches a point where she wonders why shouldn’t she always be Veil? Veil is perfect! As I said, when everyone believes you are someone else, when everyone believes you have the skills you say this someone else has, it is easy to forget you don’t actually have them which is exactly what happens with Veil. She fails because she is not real and Shallan reached the limit of her “faking”. At that point in time though, those disguises became more or less of a drug for her, a mean to face life, but I disagree she needed them in the first place. She could have progressed without them and might have progressed faster without them. I now read it more as she made them first for specific needs and ended up preferring being them because she hates herself. In the end, she just struggles to be herself because she hates it even though, deep down, she knows she can’t spend a lifetime being either Veil or Radiant as neither are her nor real. When she shuffles through them, I didn’t read it as “crazy”, just horribly mixed up in between what is real and what is not because her lies… they look real, they behave real, they read real. No wonder so many readers think Veil is a real person! Such is the magic of the Lightwearvers, they make lies become real.
I however do not think any of it ranks as “crazy” nor that Shallan is as mentally ill as the readers tend to make her be. I think what we read was the harsh learning curve of a Lightweaver without any guidance. She makes mistakes because no one was there to warn her of the danger of using her powers as she did. She kind of figured it you the rough way, but I disagree she will plummet further down. I think she now realizes she can’t pretend to be someone else each time she has a problem and she will start to work towards solving them. At least now she seems like she wants to whereas before she just wanted to escape, to run away, hence the personas.
I personally expect a lot of progress for her during the time gap. And while she will surely have other issues, I doubt they will be the same. Her arc will close up in two books, so two books to tell the truth to everyone about her family, to find the Unmade who corrupted them and to wrap it up. No more time to keep on playing with personas.
No surprise that you disagree, but also no problem. We can agree that the spiralling has probably stopped, that she will not go deeper into her malady. When I spoke of her going catatonic, I wasn’t speaking of my fears for her character, I was speaking to what she felt would happen. It’s the reason she’s made the personas in the first place; she realized her earlier method of dealing with her issues i.e. forgetting anything unpleasant and papering over it would not fly due to increased responsibility. Reference the epilogue of WOR to see what I mean. Finally, I’ll say that just because her issues aren’t on a spectrum, just because they aren’t listed in a book doesn’t mean her actions and thoughts aren’t crazy, it just means she’s unique in her crazy. Not to mention the people who wrote the DSM-IV never had to evaluate someone with magic that enhances delusions. One last thing. Whether or not we believe she’s bonkers, she actually does think she is. Perception is reality in the Cosmere. If she thinks she’s crazy then she is. Much like Kaladin still thinks of himself as worthy of slavery so he can’t get rid of the brands. Rysn thinks of herself as a cripple and so cannot be healed of her disability via Stormlight yet Lopen was able to regrow an arm because he never saw himself as broken.
Let’s continue to run up the comment count shall we?
Isn’t being traumatized a form of mental illness, too? If that book everyone talks about doesn’t list it that just means that book is incomplete.
Definitional issue: being traumatized per se is not mental illness. There are at least two recognized syndromes caused by trauma, but neither is the automatic result of trauma. Sometimes the traumatized person just calms down after the incident and is not mentally ill. (I was hit by a car once. It didn’t cure any of the various issues I might have had but it didn’t cause any new mental illness, either.)
@52: Hey, my whole purpose here is to disagree with the bulk of the readers! I don’t know why I always end up with the odd opinion out, but I do.
This being said, on the catatonic part, I agree with your statement. There are a few moments where Shallan does state she firmly believes, if she were to remember, she would turn into a quivering ball of sobs. She thinks this would happen, but it doesn’t happen. She does remember how she killed her father and she didn’t turn catatonic. She does remember she killed her mother now and she still did not turn catatonic. Shallan has a very poor opinion of her capacities to deal with the truth. She constantly thinks she cannot, but slowly, step by step, she is dealing with it. Arguably, her mother will be difficult. How does one even begin to rationalize having your own mother try to kill you? Knowing Shallan’s family was under an Unmade’s influence, knowing her mother had some “ties” with the Skybreaker I do believe there is a story yet to tell here. I also believe Shallan needs closure, she needs to know why, to understand. Once she gets the full story, it will be much easier to accept her past as right now, all she has is the knowledge her mother tried to kill her, she killed her instead and it broke her family. She feels a lot of guilt over those events and she can’t make sense out of them. She however is not turning catatonic, she merely thinks she cannot deal with it. Albeit proofs are she actually can.
I still do not think Shallan is crazy. She has a very poor opinion of herself, but she is not crazy. Her personas, they weren’t created for the sole purpose of dealing with her issues. I mean, Veil was created to infiltrate the Ghostbloods. At first, she’s just a darkeyed woman who dresses up like Tyn did. At the market, Shallan realizes she has to make Veil a high ranked darkeyed and not a lowly ranked one. Early in OB, she practices Veil. When she goes to do Adolin’s investigation, she adds another layer of to Veil: Veil now knows about taverns, alcohols and ruffians. She worries about faking it convincingly enough: even though she is Veil, she is really Shallan. She fears her “persona” will not work but she gets away with it. And the more she gets away with Veil, the more confident she grows with her disguise. In Part 2, Veil is pure escapism. The part I referred to, a few weeks ago, about her being immature because she runs off to hide as Veil instead of doing her assignments? Well, it happens more and more in Part 2. When she is Veil, Shallan can ignore everything else because everyone around her sees her as Veil, not Shallan. She can be sassy, cool, drink and play the part of this mysterious clever woman. She does only what she wants to do and no one can hold it against her because it wasn’t her… it was Veil. All they see is Veil. When she reaches Kholinar, Veil needs to know about urchins because Shallan has this plan. So she decides Veil knows about urchins, why not? It is a very slippery slope and one which seems made more out of cockiness and over-confidence than craziness. And yeah, through all of that there is the fact neither Veil nor Radiant killed their parents, this is true. She loves this. When she is pretending to be them, she does not have to think about those truths because those truths do not apply to those characters she created, but she is very much in charge. When she loses control, it isn’t the “personas” which are trying to take control of her, they do not exist, they have no will other than Shallan’s, it is more Shallan who stops making the difference in between her make-believe world and the real-one. I mean, when you hate your life and your world so much, why would you go back to it when you have the perfect excuse to vanish?
I however do not think Shallan views herself as crazy in the same manner as Kaladin views himself as a slave. Granted, I always found the explanation as to why Kaladin’s slave brand will not heal iffy at best. He rebelled against being a slave every step of the way, so the idea it is now so ingrained into his psyche he can’t heal the scars has always been very odd to me. But Shallan saying she is “crazy” does not make her “crazy”, not anymore than Adolin saying he is “unworthy” makes him “unworthy” though it arguably could be why he can’t attract a spren.
Shallan, Adolin, they both have very similar issues… Shallan constantly thinks she can’t deal with reality without realizing she is actually dealing with it. Adolin constantly thinks he is falling at being who he needs to be without realizing he is actually saving the day. They kind of have the same problem…
@53: I don’t think being traumatized is the same as having an actual mental illness… In the case of Shallan, she most definitely has trauma for what happened with her family, but Brandon did confirm she does not have a mental illness. His plans weren’t to go there and I can understand why. If Shallan had the issues some discussions threads are saying she has, then there is no upward climb for her: there is no realistic way where she will ever get better. This is a thin line to walk on, to give your characters realistic traumas, but at the same time, to give them ones they have the ability to overcome. Shallan already has a very difficult past to deal with, had Brandon given her a mental illness on top of everything, then I do think it would have been too much. Luckily, he didn’t and the more I read, the more convinced I am growing in thinking of Veil/Radiant as mere masks and not “anything real”.
Shallan just makes up so much of it as she goes… Ah another example, after the Thaylenah battle, she says “Oh Veil wants to make sure the poor people are alright.”. What? Since when does Veil care about other people? Like never? But now Shallan suddenly makes her sound like the perfect little Edgedancer… Lies, lies, lies. And how about when Shallan is about to get married and she starts making illusions of Veil and Radiant, but they vanish when she states she deserves this and she doesn’t need them?
She is not crazy, but she has one of the most powerful form of magic all characters possess. We tend to think of power in terms of efficiency on the battle field, but Shallan’s powers far exceed this. She is the perfect con woman, she can be anyone she wants, she cannot be stopped. No one will ever see her coming unless she wants them to: she is the master of reality and lies, twisting it as she goes along the way. Powerful indeed.
Who knew menstrual cramps could cause so much conversation!? I am with Wetlandernw – I think cramps could be part of your self identity. It is a way you keep track of your health. I also agree with sarrow about them really not being an illness but just being muscles working. For me, labor felt exactly like a long menstrual cramp. I guess then the question is does Stormlight remove pain while muscles are working? I believe we know it makes you stronger and quicker (could be helpful in labor!), but do you feel yourself hitting your limits through that heightened strength? I may be forgetting, but I don’t remember specifically seeing anything about this, but I do remember Kaladin feeling exhaustion even with Stormlight at one point I believe. Since your uterus is working consistently throughout your cycle, it seems reasonable that it would hit a point of exhaustion.
@56 On the whole Mental cramps being a part of self identiy berhaps this WOB on why the Nahel Bond doesn’t cure Kaladin’s depression might help.
Make of this what you will.
@15 Also I thought the Wax And Wayne Series took place AFTER Stormlight, or after the first half of it at least? Does anyone know for sure. I got the impression that Brandon Sanderson originally meant for it to take place before but then changed his mind, either way it’s quite confusing.
@BenW, I believe the Mistborn Era 2 (W&W) stories are currently said to take place between the two Stormlight Archive pentologies.
@59 Thanks.
OMG! I was gone for a few days and I come back to a whole discussion of menstrual cycle. LOL And once again, Adolin is in the middle of it, because he commented on it.
Oh Adolin, you are more precious as a character than many believe. At first glance, your dialogue seems innocuous but it becomes a point of discussion. Whether it was by design or by accident, I don’t know. We probably have to ask Brandon. But, I’m not asking, so I’ll just leave it at that.
Sidebar: Brandon is not the only author I know who actually mentioned menstruation in a book. Terry Goodkind, in one of the books in his Sword of Truth series actually mentioned it twice and it was in a subplot that affected the whole story, perhaps even the series. It’s been a long time since I read the Sword of Truth so I honestly I don’t remember what it was all about.
Moving on – Shallan has issues, though I will not call her crazy (as in she should be in an institution). But, she has enough issues that she is in need of counselling. I’m thinking of a level of PTSD wherein a person can lead a productive life – hold a job, socialize with friends and for all intent and purposes look a “normal” person to those around him or her. But, that person still goes to counselling or see a therapist be it one on one or group sessions on a regular basis.
I believe our problem here is that we tend to be “absolute” when we share our opinion. But, nothing is absolute here. Shallan is a developing character. Right now, she is already three-dimensional so we have openly opined about her as if she is a real person. But, like in real life, a person is more than just the sum of its parts.
To me, Shallan is so many things, even without Veil or Radiant in the mix. She’s a young woman forced to go out in the world to save her family. She is a talented artist even without the stormlight. She also had high hopes and dreams. I remember Shallan’s reactions when Jasnah told her that Adolin has agreed to a causal betrothal. She was so giddy because it is well known that Adolin is good looking, heir to the Kholin princedom and a shardbearer. She is also a daughter who lost both parents and lost a brother that she loves. From those alone, Shallan is already many things.
When Veil and later on Radiant came into the picture, my first thought was that they were Mittyesque to some extent. That Shallan, with her active imagination and capacity for magic can literally conjure these personas.
But, I never saw her crazy, the same way that I never saw Walty Mitty crazy. It’s just a “secret life”
Okay, its already a wall of text. Better finish this one. :-)
@BenW: I might mention one (as we science guys say) confounder.
That is: Sanderson has hinted that time travel into the past is at least potentially possible in the Cosmere. At one point he ways that Hoid has not time-traveled into the past “yet”. (I think he probably enjoyed the paradoxical nature of that statement, by the way.)
In Australia we have the Bin Chicken:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4dYWhkSbTU
@63, hahaa :D
Worldhoppers from Roshar have visited Earth?
@32 EvilMonkey
WoB have stated that Rayse and Bavadin have worked together in the past but Brandon is tight lipped on their relationship otherwise. The force that opposed Adonalsium was the group that shattered him of which the current shard holders were the members. It was just a group, not an anti adonalsium entity. Also confirmed via WoB that I can pull up later for you if you like.
@34 Gepeto
I have made my thoughts on Ialai and Mraize in the past, so don’t see a need to go into it again. I think Ialai has been defeated, and Mraize doesn’t need her. But that’s just me.
@38 Isilel
Menstrual cramps to me are still seen as a natural biological function so the individual would view them as part of being who they are. Perhaps the “group mentality” also comes into play in so far as if the society or majority views it is expected that you would have cramps, then a part of you accepts this as well. Lift became a radiant before her first period, and gets them now despite thinking to herself that she shouldn’t because she thinks she shouldn’t be growing up. So the group mentality might be part of it? Just spit balling.
@39 Gepeto
I think the reason for stormlight and regrowths extensive healing is because we have only had a taste of what the voidbringers can bring to fore. The bigger the threat, the bigger the guns the good guys need to bring. So one can only imagine the level of threats that our radiants will be facing that regeneration of that level might not be enough.
@40 Sarrow and 41 Wetlandernw
I agree with everything you both wrote
@46 Gepeto
The only thing Brandon has confirmed is that Shallan does not specifically have MPD nor fits in a specific catagory. That does not mean she is the picture of mental health. To me she is suffering from a very strong case of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
@50 and 52 EvilMonkey
Agree on all points
I just remembered that I guessed there’d be an Ialai / Amaram teamup as far back as the early release Chapter 13, and might be gloating a little bit to myself. I guess wrong so often that I am ridiculously proud whenever I get something right.
I was, however, wrong in thinking it might take the form of a marriage of convenience. I’m glad that was avoided, really.
In Bands of Mourning, the design on Terris robes are compared to strata, fwiw.
Also coming in late after about a month away and trying to catch up!
I need to do some more brushing up on Bavadin/Autonomy because the conection did not jump out of me. Although, kind of ironic that the reason they reject Ialai/Sadeas is for being…too autonomous ;)
I agree with Gepeto and others that Adolin’s awkwardness at the mention of his father is his own guilt/insecurity about not living up to his image of him. One wonders if Dalinar eventually coming clean about it will have some implications.
I enjoyed reading about the saga of the Sisterhood of Worldhopping Pants. :)
Regarding cramps – I do think there’s a troubling tendency in the medical community to view Pain as part and parcel of being a woman, and women are forced to put up with a lot they shouldn’t have to (including dehabilitating menstrual cramps) because it’s just seen as ‘normal’. But menstruation in general probably would not be healed/stopped by Stormlight, nor would the general sensation of your abdomen working. But I’d like to think they would help with pathologically bad cramps – but on the other hand if you grew up with them I can see it being seen as a part of you.
And as for mental illness, while I definitely appreciate where Brandon is going regarding things like people not completely neurotypical, it’s hard for me to view depression as anything other than an illness. In fact, I used to view it as a part of my ‘identity’ but eventually came to realize it was part of what was stopping me from really finding/being my truest self. I guess YMMV on that though.
@68 Fair enough.
He’s obviously not downplaying the struggle of people like Kaladin, and he is obviously doing his best to show other people WHY Kaladin can’t just wish it away. And while he might have it as a part of who he is, it isn’t romanticized as something awesome either, for all the magical powers Kaladin may gain acess to as a result of the Nahel bond he STILL struggles with his Depression on a daily basis. And now amount of magic can make that go away. Stormlight may help, the way anti-depressants help, but it doesn’t change the underlying problem. That’s the important thing to me. Wether it is to you I don’t know.
That being said one of my favorite Kaladin lines (you can tell me if you think it feels acurate to you) is that “while he may not be able to change the way the weeping (and such) effects him, he doesn’t have to let it rule him either.” Regardless of weather you consider it a part of you or not, either way you’re being held back, (either by a part of yourself or something outside you, the fact that your being held back doesn’t change) and either way you don’t have to let it rule you. But of course GETTING to that point is HARD, and there is NO guarantee you will stay at that point. What do you think of this idea? (I am NOT SURE that I expressed myself properly at the end there. I tried for a sort of “different roads lead to the same destination thing” or a “there may still be meaning to be found here, even if your prespective is different”, but I am not sure it got across quite right as even those last two feel over simplistic. Still I did my best.
No, that sounds about right.
FWIW, I’m glad that Sanderson didn’t make it an easy cure. In some way you might be able to say that we all struggle with different things, and that is what gives us our perspectives. I was just trying to make a distinction between something like depression (which I have not found to have any positive aspects) and something like autism or Aspergers which (while in severe cases can be debilitating) which can just be different (but maybe others would feel differently about that).
But given as how Stormlight seems to be very predicated on self perception of identity, I suppose that’s what matters. For a long time I did feel that depression was just how I was and that voice was reality. Now I don’t (most of the time) so perhaps eventually I (or even Kaladin) might reach a point where Stormlight would help cultivate a healthier brain chemistry.
@70 Thanks I am glad we are able to have a good discussion about it. Speakingg of Asperger’s I believe I mentioned early that I have it. Well my post was orignially a LOT longer. I cut it down for brevity, and thought i did a good job of it, but I couldn’t help but worry that I had left something out that would lead to a misunderstanding. I am glad were unfounded.
Guys! How did we not talk about this?
Is this one of the strange effects of Urithiru or something else? (Now that I’ve typed Urithiru out I realize it’s another palindrome.)
Also, you guys are talking about people not being able to live forever but don’t we have a lot of really old people in the Cosmere? (Hoid and Vasher coming to mind quickest)
Just like ive been looking for Wind mentions on this current reread after KoWaT (Elia stele being the big one)
I love that this epigraph mentioned not being a philosopher or storyteller, before we know it’s Dalinar in-story..and the mysterious epigraph author right now mentioned that they were a historian and philosopher haha, basically the opposite clue. I still don’t think it’s Jasnah or Sig since they don’t know about Kals mission and know about Szeth and especially the Wind, it doesn’t fit anyone besides like Kalak, or maybe Ishar after they cure him.
Ironically Urithiru is already WAY more impressive than the Dubai tower because it actually has indoor plumbing haha..even if it was 1/4 of the size it would still be more impressive.
That dictators ego project needed poop trucks non-stop to clean out the waste. It’s comically short sighted even compared to their palm frond islands, and even more insidious because they use slave labor. Not singling them out, us in the west aren’t innocent of that or the religious extremism, but still. “Tallest skyscraper” becomes a lot less impressive in that context. Adam Something has some hilarious videos about it.
But yeah, honestly even after many rereads over the decade I still can barely wrap my head around the scope of Urithiru, even with that redditor making a cg mockup and scale drawings
Haha yeah it’s true, besides Casca in Berserk I can’t think of any other fantasy that actually brings up menstrual cycles. I didn’t think Adolin was being a dick there either, he’s dated a lot he’s not a clueless dude, but I also didn’t think she was being overly mean to him here or anything, especially the way she says the lines in the graphic audio, it’s more joking and not harsh but like you said, she’s hungover and young regardless
Adolins awkwardness about being compared to Dalinar is 1000% because he killed Sadeas and feels he isn’t as noble, not anything to do with the rift or past Dalinar, he lays it out later on in Shadesmar when he comes clean to her about it on the honorspren ship. It isn’t until RoW he learned about Dalinars actions from OB, right now he still views Dalinar as his current, perfectly honorable self, and that he can’t live up to it because he murdered in cold blood (and is also correct to not regret it haha, 100% justified, zero need to feel bad about it)
Best part of all the ghost blood scenes is thinking of them in the context of TLM and Kelsier, we know how chill the Scadrial faction is with Marasi and how they think Mraize and gang have gone rogue and extreme, its a cell he doesn’t have direct control over but are willing to do anything to get stormlight to Kelsier. Kel could be brutal in the fight against the final empire but really doubt he’d be cool with capturing Lift, playing both sides though? Probably, from what we saw with helping Gavilar get anti light, kill heralds and return void bringers. Their a pro scadrial organization and the fate of Roshar is kind of incidental to them, although odium winning and raising the Cosmere can only be a bad thing for them, and we know from sunlit & sixth of the dusk they end up in a cold war anyway.
I enjoy Mraize, he’s still way less scummy and hateful than Moash or Amaram haha. Though I wonder why a Thaylen dude is happy to exploit his home planet to help Scadrial, though with Moonlight and Codenames from Sel and the aether guy I guess it isn’t unusual
Haha isn’t this supposed to be an analysis for the whole book?
We knew Mraize is a worldhopper, his introduction in the basement and Ash’s chapter at his house shows aether’s, yolen sticks, metals, stuff from all the Cosmere planets. I guess you could say he imports it but since he’s a ghostblood working under a silver light born Southern Scadrian it’s a safe bet