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Do the Heralds know about Aons? I am asking specifically about Shalash. Shao, Ale, Ashe. Transformation, Beauty, Illumination.
Let's say that some of them do and some of them don't. The question is "do the Heralds know about Aons?" How cosmere-aware are the Heralds? It depends on the Herald.
Were the Heralds born on Roshar?
RAFO.
Is a Herald being able to sense where the other Honorblades are still canon?
No. It's possible I will decide to canonize it, but right now it is not.
Can a Returned be made from Stormlight?
How would you count the Heralds?
I haven't read much, so I don't really know what you're talking about.
In the Stormlight books, there is a set of people who are constantly reborn, into full sized grown bodies that are being created for them. Would you count that as being Returned?
Or do you count Returned...What's your definition, right? You can create something that is Returned-like. But your definition of what is Returned and what is not, is going to be involved in that.
You have stated that each Knights Radiant Order gets their own unique ability, for lack of a better word, due to the combination of their Surges. For instance, you have stated this ability for the Windrunners is strength of squires. My question - is this due to the Nahel bond, or just inherent in the Surges combining. Would a non-Radiant get these abilities from the Honorblades, or would they be out of luck due to no Nahel bond?
Good question! The unique abilities have more to do with the powers interacting, same as how Twinborn will often manifest some odd side effects of the powers interacting. But there are limitations. For example, Jezrien didn't actually have any squires, as none of the Heralds did.
None of the Heralds mention or address the Almighty in the opening scene of [The Way of Kings]; it's a little strange, considering they are his champions. Have they seen or spoken to the Almighty?
Yes, the Heralds have spoken with the Almighty. They also feel that what has been done to them is partially his fault. They are all broken in some way and aren't really honorable anymore.
Was that how and why the deal with Odium showed up?
RAFO.
The Heralds, back before Honor died, were they directly powered by Honor?
Yes. You’ll find out more about that, but the Shardblades [pretty sure he means Honorblades here] were pieces of Honor’s soul that he gave them and direct access to his essence.
Like Vin and Elend?
Yeah, a little like that. That’s why Honorblades don’t work like Shardblades do, like Radiants do.
The second part of the question is, what would happen if they were directly powered by Honor and they were holding Nightblood?
RAFO
As of the end of Words of Radiance, how much do the Heralds know about events on the Shattered Plains?
Depends on the Herald.
Can the Heralds Surgebind without their [Honor]Blades, and if not are they under the same restrictions the Radiants are?
[...] I will say that the Heralds without their Blades are incapable of the powers you are familiar with. It doesn't mean there aren't other things they can do, but they are incapable of the powers you are familiar with throughout the book.
The arches in The Way of Kings and Words of Radiance. The faces in the arches, are they dependent on something that happens in the chapter, or are they random or is there a pattern?
They do, but Isaac picks them, not me. So. There is a rubric for it, but-- so there is some significance, but Isaac is behind that.
You said earlier... putting back splinters. Was the Oath breaking part of that?
Oath breaking? Oh, the Oathpact. The abandoning of the Oathpact we will talk a lot more about in the future, so I'm gonna RAFO that for now.
Speaking of the other Prologues… I have a looney theory that the assassin Liss is actually the Herald Chana in disguise. :D
Chanaranach has definitely been seen onscreen by at least one character at least one time in the first two books.
I just read Edgedancer. I was just wondering... Did Ishar deceive Nalan on purpose or was he just wrong-- he had wrong information?
All the Heralds are insane.
Okay.
It manifests in different ways. Do not trust anything any Herald says. Ever.
Okay.
Nale trusts Ishar too much.
Okay, but so did he do it on purpose, or...?
Um... So "on purpose" is a difficult thing when you're referring to someone with the psychology that Ishar has.
Did he know what it was-- that it was a lie?
*sighs* Alright, I'll RAFO that until I get to him, but the answer is kind of a yes and a no. Okay? So there is part of him that knows and there is part of him that doesn't want to believe it. And yet the things he's been doing lately in Roshar are done because he knows what's coming.
Is that theory correct where, like, the Heralds are basically, like, reversed now. Kind of going against their thing or...
*laughs* He won't tell us.
I know, I know. That was my question, which I knew you wouldn't *inaudible*.
I just wanna know more what Szeth and the stone is?
You get-- you get a RAFO card. There you go.
In Words of Radiance and The Way of Kings, was there something important about the stone and the herald <in> the *inaudible* <scene> that has to do kind of with the stone, and maybe Tien giving him rocks? Am I reading too much into that?
Some of that is reading too much into it and some of it is real. I'm not going to tell you what is what. But the st-. . . there is definitely something about that.
So far during The Stormlight Archive we've seen that the spren bond appears to have some distinct advantages (i.e. armor, more efficient Stormlight consumption, access to a variety of weapons) over what Tanavast via the Oathpact provided the Heralds. With the exception of Nale, and the fact that the Heralds had no need for Stormlight, can you please tell me one way in which a Herald had a distinct advantage over a level 5 Radiant of their corresponding order?
Rebirth. *pause* The Heralds had access to raw levels of power that no Radiant could obtain.
Are we gonna hear what happened after the Heralds gave up their oath and *inaudible*
You will-- you will see more of that.
Is there uh-- is there gonna be more side characters like Taln? Where they kind of like *inaudible*
Um, Taln and Ash--two of the Heralds--are main characters in the second five books, so that's where you're going to see *inaudible*.
And then the curse Kelek’s Breath, is that a clue as to the origin of some of the Heralds?
Erm… Explain why you think it might be.
Uh, well, Warbreaker. The use of Breath… It seems like they have similar strength to somebody who has extra Endowment. So I’m wondering if they come from-- I can’t remember the name..
The Heralds-- You’re wondering if the Heralds come from Nalthis?
Yeah.
The Heralds do not come from Nalthis, but that is an excellent question.
On Roshar, if a Herald were to die, to not-really-come-back die, would it possible for someone to take up the mantle of that Herald?
You're gonna need to read and find out, because this is the first time that happened was at the end of Oathbringer.
Because he is dead--
He is dead dead.
I asked a question at the panel, I asked if the person you refuse to say who he is, I was trying to talk about Taln.
Oh!
Not Hoid.
So what about Taln?
Is there anything you'll tell us about him?
What do you want to know? Ask me a specific question.
Is he Rosharan?
Is he Rosharan? Taln is Rosharan.
*inaudible*
Define Rosharan, how about that?
Native to Roshar.
That I have to RAFO.
Are the Heralds...
The Heralds are from the same place that Taln is from.
I'm really curious about Aimia and I hope to see more about in the fourth book. Have the Heralds or Hoid been there and will they reveal some stuff about it?
Yes, the Heralds have been there and yes, Hoid has been there. However, I don't think there will be info about Aimia in book four, but in a novella I'm planning to write, like Edgedancer. The story will be about some characters travelling to Aimia.
(During discussion on the Surgebinding chart, found in the front endpages of The Way of Kings hardcovers)
I'm pretty sure the Herald faces all match up to their respective orders.
What caused a Desolation to end? Was it just the defeat of Odium's forces? Because the Desolations start when the Heralds break under torture.
Because the Heralds can no longer be in existence. There is a certain period of time that they can be there, and after that, if they're there, they will start a new one. So the Heralds do need to leave for a Desolation to end
Oh. So they've got a time limit.
They do. Otherwise the Desolation will start again. What they discovered is not all of them have to. As long as one remains, the Desolation will not start again.
So, by the nine leaving, did that actually break the Oathpact for them? Did it change the cycle of Desolations?
They have not completely broken the Oathpact, despite what they may think.
So, what we see at the end, with the Unmade, and it seems like Jezrien, getting trapped in gems. Is that basically possible, because, they have been, particularly in the case of the Heralds, infused with so much Investiture that they're basically being trapped in the gems instead of Stormlight?
They're not human anymore, yeah.
Are the Heralds Rosharan?
Well, you will have to Read And Find Out on that one. Good question.
How do the Heralds come back? As Cognitive Shadows, how do they a physical body?
That system will be explained in the coming books, so that is a RAFO. I'm gonna dig into it pretty deeply. It's relevant for multiple reasons...
In the original version, Taln ended up in someone else, like they would get a body from someone else, which was part of fueling the "Is he crazy, is he not," because people were like, "I recognize this guy!" I don't use that system anymore.
That's what I was wondering, because the Fused--
They use something kind of more like the Fused in the original draft, it's not that process anymore.
Is that gonna give us lead-ins to how it worked with Kelsier?
Maybe. Maybe. You shall see.
Are these old Radiants?
Those are Heralds. That's Ash, who you'll see that the very end of this [Oathbringer]. That's Jezrien who's also near the end. You haven't met her [Vedel] yet. Ishar, you have heard about. And it's identified in this book who he is. But those are artist interpretations of them, in-world. They're like the Sistine Chapel versions of the Heralds. They might not look exactly like that, but that is an in-world interpretation of them by an artist.
Have we-- I think you mentioned in a previous signing that we'd already met one member of every Order of the Knights Radiant.
Yes, I think you have.
My question is, have we met two Edgedancers? And is one of the Dustbringers a viewpoint character?
One of the Dustbringers is eventually a point-of-view character.
Haven't been yet?
No, not yet, I don't think. But it depends if you count the Heralds as members of their order.
I don't.
Oh, see I would, because they're kind of heads of their Order. If you don't count them you have not met some from every Order.
Have we met someone from the Dustbringers?
Well-- Dustbringers are really complicated. Really complicated. So that's the weird one. Okay? So let's shelve that one. You'll see why it's really weird later on.
Are Heralds are capable of procreation?
Yes. Not necessarily saying in the traditional way, but yes, Heralds are capable of procreation.
Are the Heralds native to Roshar?
RAFO (Man, you're good at asking those, aren't you?)
Are we going to see any other viewpoints from the Heralds?
Yes, you will see-- I mean, Taln and Ash are both main characters, right? But you should see other viewpoints of other Heralds as we progress. The ones that survive long enough to get viewpoints.
Are they gonna be viewpoints in this current timeline?
You will see more in this current timeline. I know specifically several that are going to be interludish sort of things coming up.
Can you confirm the real names of the Heralds for me? I have Jezrien (ˈjɛzɹən), Nale (for Nalan) - is that right?
Nale (neil) is what-- Nale is, yes, yes.
Chana [pronounced Shana] or Chana...
Yeah.
Vedel.
Vedel (vəˈdɛl), yeah. Chana (ˈt͡ʃænə) is also called Chanarach (ˈt͡ʃænəɹæt͡ʃ). Either one would be alright.
Okay, but her birth name...
Probably-- I think Chanarach is actually her birth name and Chana is the nickname.
Vedel... Pali, for Pailiah?
Yeah, I think Pali (ˈpæli) is the nickname in that case.
Okay, Ash?
No, that's a nickname.
What's the real one?
Shalash (ʃəˈlɑʃ).
That's not he just the Vorin...
No, that one was actually symmetrical.
Awesome. Battar (bəˈtɑɹ)?
Yes.
Kalak?
Kalak (kəˈlɑk), yes.
Talenel (tæləˈnɛl), with a nickname Taln (tæln)?
Yes.
And Ishar (ɪˈʃɑɹ)?
Yes.
Does a Herald using an Honorblade consume the same "dangerous" amounts of Stormlight?
Honorblades are less efficient; this doesn't change when a Herald uses them. (But they have other advantages.)
Are Honorblades closer in power to Nightblood than they are to Shardblades made from Spren?
Hard to say. They're all similar, but at the same time, very different. And in a way, Nightblood is what you might call a "Third Generation" blade.
Ah gotcha. And in this analogy, Honorblades would be 1st gen and Sprenblades would be 2nd gen?
Yes.
Could the Heralds be considered the splinters or would it be the Honourblades they once held? Or perhaps are they something else entirely?
That's a RAFO, more because I don't want to dig into the nature of the Heralds until the second five books, and would rather not have people's eyes on them too much right now.
Is the Palanaeum named for Palah?
Yes. In fact, it was named based on—it was Greek in our world—the Athenaeum? It was based off of that.
Did we see Palah?
I believe every one of the Heralds is mentioned or shown somewhere in the first book.
Someone was wondering whether the old woman who was wandering around the Palanaeum was her.
That is a very good guess. I won't say specifically, because some of them are intended to be more obvious and some of them are intended to be red herrings. So, that was a very good guess.
Hey Peter, I've been meaning to ask you about this since Alice's article on the Heralds went up. In it, she lists each Herald's role (e.g. Jezrien is the King, Battar is the Counselor, Kalak is the Maker, etc.), and I noticed that those same roles were listed (but not used) in the Radiant Quiz as the archetypes for each Order. Some of these show up in the books, but a few don't, and the source for those appears to be an old old email from you. I wanted to know how canonical these are, and whether I can include them in the Coppermind (and if I can, it would be nice to know what they are - roles, titles, archetypes?)
These, along with Jester, are the names of the Photoshop layers for the faces on the chapter arches. Since the words themselves don’t really appear in the books, I couldn’t say that they’re canon. In our internal wiki we call them Face/Title. I don’t have an opinion on putting them in the Coppermind.
I've been wondering if the heralds are Surgebinders without Honorblades?
That's a RAFO. That's a big fat RAFO.
Do the Heralds know about AonDor?
I would say, conceptually, a few of them do, but not in specific detail.
'Cause Ash's name is a combination of Transformation, Beauty, and Light. I didn't know if that was a coincidence, or--
There are some non-coincidences in the linguistics that people have started to pick up on, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the people who have those names know about the origins of their names.
You mentioned in a signing that all the heralds are insane. My question is about how they got that way.
Were they insane at the moment they gave up their swords? Was it more from being tortured?
Or, was it a direct consequence of giving up the oathpact?
A third possibility is that being alive for millenia tends to crack you up. Do they even sleep? Not sleeping would really do it.
RAFO, I'm afraid. We have heralds as main viewpoint characters. I'll let the narrative do the explaining on these questions.
Brandon, what is the rough timeline for us to learn more about the Oathpact? Is this something that will come out when the Heralds become flashback characters in the back five books, or will there be more information in the earlier books?
RAFO, I'm afraid.
The old ardent in the Palanaeum is Pailiah.
I was wondering about the pictures in the cover of this [Oathbringer]. Are they specific characters in the book, or just art?
They are the Heralds. I went to some artists and said, "Do me your rendition of something that would be on the Sistine Chapel in-world for the Heralds," so that's four of the ten. So that is what we ended up with.
Could the mantle of Herald be passed to another person. Could they--
Read And Find Out, I'm afraid.
The number 10 seems to be a recurring theme in this world. Are the "ten fools" the antithesis of the ten orders of the knights radiant?
Yes, ten is a number of mythological import in the world. The Ten Fools are, essentially, the opposites of the Ten Heralds--who each represented an ideal. (Those ideals were later adopted by the orders of Knights Radiant, so yes, there is a connection--but there's a step between them.)
How does one become an Herald? And is there any way for a someone else to take up the mantle of a Herald?
RAFO
You've said that Returned count as Cognitive shadows "stapled" back into their bodies, and that the Heralds are at least similar. Would I be right in assuming that Elantrians could be considered as Cognitive Shadows as well, or am I barking up the wrong tree?
Elantrians are something different. They don't actually "die" to be created.
Recognize that the term Cognitive Shadow is an in-cosmere theory, which I'm not going to comment on as the creator of the setting. The theory is this:
Investiture seeks sapience. It looks for someone to control it or, in some instances, spontaneously adopts personality.
A mind (Cognitive aspect of a person) can become infused with Investiture. This acts a little like minerals with petrified wood, replacing the mind and personality with investiture.
When the actual person dies, this investiture imprint remains behind. A copy of the soul, but not the actual soul.
Others disagree with this, and think the soul itself persists. Still others reject the theory in its entirety.
Huh.
... Kandra are almost literally stapled to their bodies with Hemalurgy - would they count as such, to the in-setting scholars?
No, they wouldn't. They are beings who have had their souls twisted by Hemalurgy--the soul never left, it's just been messed up. Someone else who has a soul stapled to a body with Hemalurgy would count though.
Is Wit a Herald?
Wit is NOT a herald.
I'm loathed to ask two questions but this is a clarification - it was reported way back that you confirmed that the ardent in the Palanaeum is Pailiah. Are you willing to confirm?
There is a Herald in close proximity to Taravangian, but she's not anyone in his immediate inner circle seen commonly on screen.
Which is your favorite of the ten fools, and why?
Uh-- I don't know. I honestly don't know.
Can you give me a name of one of them, then?
That I haven't named yet? Those are in the notes, I have to look those things up. I don't know. We're gonna do a ten fools painting for the next one, maybe. We were gonna do it for this one. I'm not sure who my favorite is. I'd have to sit and think about it, perhaps more time than we have right now. It's going to depend on Isaac's sketches of them and things like that. Maybe, uh, Jezrien's fool. Probably Jezrien's fool.
What's the name of that one?
I can't remember. Like I said, I have 'em in a list. I have to go look at the notes and look them up every time. I don't use them, like, I just write--
Not like the Heralds, that you're using all the time. They're just the ten fools.
Right, I just use, even when I'm writing, I'm like "Jezrien's Fool," and then I go look up the name of it.
The amount of Heralds that we have seen so far. Two? I had thought Wit was one.
Wit is not one, but you've seen Ash, you've seen Taln, you've seen Jezrien and Kalak in the prelude, you've seen Nale. Yeah, he was chasing Lift, among other things. You've heard of several others, but the others are going to start getting more and more obscure from there. I don't think there's any others.
Nale mentions that he's the only Herald that ends up joining his Order of Radiants, eventually. Are there any Radiants that joined other Orders?
No, good question.
