The Stormlight Archive, Books 1-3: The Way of Kings, Words of Radiance, Oathbringer

by Brandon Sanderson

A vial of pale sand. A couple of thick hairpins. A lock of golden hair. The branch of a tree with writing on it she couldn’t read. A silver knife. An odd flower preserved in some kind of solution. There were no plaques to explain these mementos. That chunk of pale pink crystal looked like it might be some kind of gemstone, but why was it so delicate? Bits of it had flaked off in its case, as if simply setting it down had almost crushed it.

Easter egg reference to other cosmere books

Zahel had drawn a circle in the sand and was throwing little colored rocks into it.

Color reference. Vasher from warbreaker

But boy, you’ve got red on your ears like I’ve never seen.”

Another color reference

“You do not yet understand the nature of lies. I had that trouble myself, long ago. The Shards here are very strict. You will have to see the truth, child, before you can expand upon it. Just as a man should know the law before he breaks it.”

Shallan watched him go, the deep things within her settling again, returning to the forgotten parts of her mind. She realized she had not even asked the man his name.

Shallan meets hoid

“Is not just water,” Rock said. “Is water of life. It is connection to gods. If Unkalaki swim in it, sometimes they see place of gods.”

“On top, is water. Beneath, is not. Is something else. Water of life. The place of the gods. This thing is true. I have met a god myself.” “A god like Syl?” Kaladin asked. “Or maybe a riverspren?” Those were somewhat rare, but supposedly able to speak at times in simple ways, like windspren. “No,” Rock said. He leaned in, as if saying something conspiratorial. “I saw Lunu’anaki.” “Uh, great,” Moash said. “Wonderful.” “Lunu’anaki,” Rock said, “is god of travel and mischief. Very powerful god. He came from depths of peak ocean, from realm of gods.” “What did he look like?” Lopen asked, eyes wide. “Like person,” Rock said. “Maybe Alethi, though skin was lighter. Very angular face. Handsome, perhaps. With white hair.” Sigzil looked up sharply. “White hair?” “Yes,” Rock said. “Not grey, like old man, but white—yet he is young man. He spoke with me on shore. Ha! Made mockery of my beard. Asked what year it was, by Horneater calendar. Thought my name was funny. Very powerful god.” “Were you scared?” Lopen asked. “No, of course not. Lunu’anaki cannot hurt man. Is forbidden by other gods. Everyone knows this.”

Rock has met hoid. Shardpools are entrance to shademar.

Sigzil looked troubled, and had only touched half of his drink. He stared at it, though when Moash asked him what was wrong, Sigzil made an excuse about being tired.

Sigzil knows that the person rock was talking about is hoid.

Love . . . love is like a classical melody.” Shallan grinned. “If you end your performance too quickly, your audience is disappointed?”

“That’s right,” Adolin said with a nod. “Stick to women your own age.” Wit grinned. “Well, that might be a little harder. I think there’s only one of those around these parts, and she and I never did get along.”

“Your bond to me grants two primary classes of ability,” Wyndle said. “The first, manipulation of friction, you’ve already—don’t yawn at me!—discovered. We have been using that well for many weeks now, and it is time for you to learn the second, the power of Growth. You aren’t ready for what was once known as Regrowth, the healing of—”

Surely she’d escaped Darkness, the man in the black and silver with the pale crescent birthmark on his cheek. The man with the dead, lifeless stare.

She is describing Nale. One of the ten heralds for justice. Patron of skybreakers

And you can metabolize food directly into Stormlight.”

The little animal was like a cremling, but with wings. Bound wings, tied-up legs. It had a strange little face, not crabbish like a cremling. More like a tiny axehound, with a snout, mouth, and eyes. It seemed sickly, and its shimmering eyes were pained. How could she tell that? The creature sucked the awesomeness from Lift. She actually saw it go, a glistening whiteness that streamed from her to the little animal. It opened its mouth, drinking it in.

Larkin can consume investiture

“I’m no highspren. Laws don’t matter; what’s right matters.”

“All stories told have been told before. We tell them to ourselves, as did all men who ever were. And all men who ever will be. The only things new are the names.”

As I fear not a child with a weapon he cannot lift, I will never fear the mind of a man who does not think.’”

Unlike a sword, scorn has only the bite you give it.”

The wisest of men know that to render an insult powerless, you often need only to embrace it.”

benevolent tyrant is preferable to the disaster of weak rule.

“I will do what I can to help,” Wit said, “and for that reason, I must go. I cannot risk too much, because if he finds me, then I become nothing—a soul shredded and broken into pieces that cannot be reassembled. What I do here is more dangerous than you could ever know.” He turned to go. “Wit,” Dalinar called. “Yes?” “If who finds you?” “The one you fight, Dalinar Kholin. The father of hatred.” Wit saluted, then jogged off.

Odium seeks hoid

“I’m not some glorious knight of ancient days. I’m a broken man. Do you hear me, Syl? I’m broken.” She zipped up to him and whispered, “That’s what they all were, silly.” She streaked away.

This was the off year, when there wouldn’t even be a highstorm on Lightday in the middle—part of the thousand-day cycle of two years that made up a full storm rotation.

It was a classic ploy. Discredit your enemy, then kill him, to make certain he didn’t become a martyr.

He swore he saw an enormous figure walking up there, a glowing inhuman form, followed by another, alien and sleek. Striding the storm. Leg after leg, until the glow passed.

Some kind of strange spren zipped past their enclosure, red and violet and reminiscent of lightning.

To age truly was to suffer the ultimate treason, that of one’s body against oneself.

He turned his attention back to the book, the Diagram. That grand plan he had devised on his singular day of unparalleled brilliance.

They had been startled when that one arrived on the Shattered Plains. Already they hypothesized that the girl had been trained. If not by Jasnah, then by the girl’s brother, before his death.

Jasnah had once defined a fool as a person who ignored information because it disagreed with desired results.

For example, each order had different Ideals, or standards, to determine advancement. Some were specific, others left to the interpretation of the spren. Also, some orders were individualistic, while others—like the Windrunners—functioned in teams, with a specific hierarchy.

“Like fresh blue paint on a wall.”

Another color reference

“Fleet kept running,” Kaladin growled, getting back under Elhokar’s arm. “What?” “He couldn’t win, but he kept running. And when the storm caught him, it didn’t matter that he’d died, because he’d run for all he had.” “Sure. All right.” The king sounded groggy, though Kaladin couldn’t tell if it was the alcohol or the blood loss. “We all die in the end, you see,” Kaladin said. The two of them walked down the corridor, Kaladin leaning on his spear to keep them upright. “So I guess what truly matters is just how well you’ve run. And Elhokar, you’ve kept running since your father was killed, even if you screw up all the storming time.”

“That is beside the point, however. This plateau is a circle.” “Many are circular.” “Not this circular,” Shallan said, striding forward. Now that she was here, she could see just how irregularly . . . well, regular the plateau was. “I was looking for a dais on a plateau, but didn’t realize the scale of what I was searching for. This entire plateau is the dais upon which the Oathgate sat. “Don’t you see? The other plateaus were created by some kind of disaster—they are jagged, broken. This place is not. That’s because it was already here when the shattering happened. On the old maps it was a raised section, like a giant pedestal. When the Plains were broken, it remained this way.”

Killing was a young man’s game, if only because the old men fell first.

I AM CALLED. I MUST GO. A DAUGHTER DISOBEYS. YOU WILL SEE NO FURTHER VISIONS, CHILD OF HONOR. THIS IS THE END.

HE BETRAYED HIS OATH.

HE WILL KILL YOU.

The Words, Kaladin. That was Syl’s voice. You have to speak the Words! I FORBID THIS. YOUR WILL MATTERS NOT! Syl shouted. YOU CANNOT HOLD ME BACK IF HE SPEAKS THE WORDS! THE WORDS, KALADIN! SAY THEM! “I will protect even those I hate,” Kaladin whispered through bloody lips. “So long as it is right.”

THE WORDS ARE ACCEPTED, the Stormfather said reluctantly.

I was only as dead as your oaths, Kaladin.

“A highstorm,” Kaladin said, shooting up through the sky after Szeth. “The red storm is from the Parshendi, but why is there a highstorm coming? This isn’t the time for one.” “My father,” Syl said, voice growing solemn. “He brought the storm, rushing its pace. He’s . . . broken, Kaladin. He doesn’t think any of this should be happening. He wants to end it all, wash everyone away, and try to hide from the future.”

Not when I’m here with you, ready. The delay is primarily something of the dead. They need to be revived each time.

To Shallan’s left, an enormous ribbed tower—shaped like cups of increasingly smaller sizes stacked atop one another—broke the peaks. Urithiru.

The plateau hadn’t contained the portal. The plateau was the portal.

This Shardblade had no gemstone at the pommel to indicate.

“So they’re all spren,” he said. “Shardblades.” Syl grew solemn. “Dead spren,” Kaladin added. “Dead,” Syl agreed. “Then they live again a little when someone summons them, syncing a heartbeat to their essence.” “How can something be ‘a little’ alive?” “We’re spren,” Syl said. “We’re forces. You can’t kill us completely. Just . . . sort of.”

“What about this?” he asked, looking over the thin, silvery weapon. An unornamented Blade. That was supposed to be odd. “It doesn’t scream when I hold it.” “That’s because it’s not a spren,” Syl said softly. “What is it, then?” “Dangerous.”

“I think this is one of the Honorblades, the swords of the Heralds.”

“The Honorblades are what we are based on, Kaladin. Honor gave these to men, and those men gained powers from them. Spren figured out what He’d done, and we imitated it. We’re bits of His power, after all, like this sword. Be careful with it. It is a treasure.”