Roshar Reader

Chapter 38 · reading

Roshar 101

World

Society, stormlight, creatures, and gear — only as far as this chapter has explained them.

A lumbering chull with a stony barnacled shell

Chull

Common draft and pack beast

The giant crabs that pull everything on Roshar.

A chasmfiend rearing over a plateau

Chasmfiend

Hunted by when a chrysalis is spotted

The monster Dalinar and Adolin brought down on the hunt.

A greatshell, vast and plated

Greatshell

Largest native animals; some hunted for

The giant-crab family — are the local kind.

A massive Ryshadium in war gear

Ryshadium

Chosen mount of a few · Alethi

Dalinar's huge — the one that chose him.

A fallen thunderclast of stone

Thunderclast

war-beast; enemy of

The stone giants lying dead after the .

Infused spheres glowing in a pouch

Spheres

Currency, lighting, and a store of

Glowing glass coins that are also the lights in the room.

A massive chasmfiend gemheart

Gemheart

The prize of every

The huge gem they cut out of the .

A Shardblade of pale misted metal

Shardblade

The most coveted weapon in the world

. Then a six-foot blade.

A warrior in glowing Shardplate

Shardplate

The other half of being a

The glowing armor kings wear into rooms they should not need armor for.

A Soulcaster of rings and gemstones

Soulcaster

National-level ; food, stone, and emergency miracles

The device that turned stone to smoke around a trapped child.

A gemstone fabrial of brass and light

Fabrial

Practical magic of the modern kingdoms

Navani's glowing machines — put to work.

A pair of spanreeds on a leveled desk

Spanreed

Long-distance writing; the closest thing Roshar has to a letter that talks back

Two pens that are the same pen.

A small dull oathstone

Oathstone

The leash of a Truthless · Shin

The rock that makes the say yes.

A sphere that holds darkness instead of light

Black sphere

Gavilar's last secret

The that leaks night instead of light.

Bridgemen carrying a siege bridge into fire

Siege bridge

The reason exists

The thing carries so soldiers do not have to.

A darkeyed soldier's spear

Spear

Kaladin's true weapon

The thing Kaladin is when he is not allowed to be a surgeon.

Dried blackbane leaves

Blackbane

Kaladin's hidden exit

The poison Kaladin carried when he had given up.

A worn copy of The Way of Kings

The Way of Kings

Dalinar's conscience, in bound form

The storming book Dalinar will not put down.

Shallan's sketchfolio, crowded with faces

Shallan's sketchbook

Shallan's memory, tools, and cover

The red-haired girl's book of everyone she has looked at.

Sas nahn · slave pair
Forehead slave brands, a glyphpair seared in

Slave brands

The legal and social mark of a slave

The scars that made a squadleader into property.

Shash · dangerous
The shash glyph brand, meaning dangerous

Shash brand

Warning-mark on a slave too likely to fight

The brand that says this slave will try something.

Honorblades standing in a ring of stone

Honorblade

Herald's personal weapon; a pillar of

The swords stuck in the stone and walked away from.

Bridge Four in leather vests at the lumberyard

Bridge Four

Kaladin's crew · Alethi

The everyone knows will die.

The red banners of House Sadeas

Sadeas princedom

Alethi highprincedom; owner of the · Alethi

The red camp that owns .

Kholin blue banners

Kholin princedom

One highprincedom among ten — that also happens to hold the throne · Alethi

Blue banners, old Codes, Dalinar's camp.

Ten warcamps on the edge of the Plains

Alethi highprinces

The ten rulers who actually command Alethi armies · Alethi

Ten , ten , one war nobody is winning together.

The Cobalt Guard in Kholin blue

Cobalt Guard

guard · Alethi

The blue-coated elite around the Blackthorn.

Grey-robed ardents in a Vorin library

Ardentia

clerical order; keepers of and doctrine · Alethi

The grey-robed scholars who own the and the libraries.

Knights Radiant in glowing Plate from a vision

Knights Radiant

Historical knightly order; maybe a vision, maybe a memory

The glowing knights in Dalinar's storm-dreams.

Parshendi warriors in warform carapace

Parshendi

The other army in the War of Reckoning · Parshendi

The singing army on the other side of the chasm.

Spearmen under Amaram's green-and-gold banners

Amaram's army

Amaram's princely host in Alethkar · Alethi

The army where Kaladin was Stormblessed.

Alethi lighteyes and darkeyes caste contrast

Lighteyes and darkeyes

The caste line that structures Alethi armies, towns, and law.

Light eyes = lighteyes. Dark eyes = darkeyes.

Dahn and nahn as two ranked ladders of Alethi society

Dahn and nahn

The numbered ranks inside the eye-color caste.

Dahn = . Nahn = darkeyes. First beats tenth.

Alethi highprinces in their warcamps

Highprince

De facto kings of their princedoms; the king's authority over them is thin.

Ten highprinces. Ten . One weak king.

Darkeyed soldier addressing a lighteyed brightlord

Brightlord

The everyday title that marks who gives orders.

Brightlord = man. Brightness = lighteyed woman.

Vorin ardents in plain robes

Ardents and the Ardentia

Priests, scholars, and scribes of kingdoms.

Ardents: priests who may read, copy, and argue doctrine.

Vorin woman with left hand covered by a havah sleeve

Safehand

Modesty mark of womanhood.

Left hand covered. Right hand free.

Woman writing in Vorin women's script

Women's script

The script of wards, scholars, and wives who handle a house's reading.

Women write. Men, except and , do not.

Alethi glyphs carved in stone

Glyphs

The accepted writing of men: shapes to recognize, not literature.

Glyphs for men. for books.

Branded darkeyed slaves in a caravan

Slavery

How Sadeas staffs the most lethal job on the Plains.

are slaves put in front of arrows.

Sadeas bridgemen carrying a bridge toward the chasms

Bridge crews

Human shields and mobile crossings. Not soldiers. Not expected to live.

first. Bodies fill the gaps.

Alethi warcamp layout: palisades, lumberyard, barracks

Warcamps

Permanent siege towns. The war has lasted years and grown roots.

Ten camps, ten , one war nobody is winning.

Vorin temple, glyph, and custom

Vorinism

The religion that sets caste, literacy, and the afterlife for Alethkar, Jah Keved, and Kharbranth.

Vorin: Almighty, Heralds, covered , women write, men fight.

Vorin vision of the Almighty in the storm

The Almighty

Apparent source of Dalinar's visions.

The Almighty: God.

The ten Heralds as legendary champions

The Heralds

saints and patrons of the divine attributes.

: ten Heralds in heaven. Prelude: nine deserters and one left behind.

A battlefield at the end of a Desolation

Desolations

The past the Almighty's visions keep forcing on Dalinar.

The visions say another Desolation is coming.

Vorin image of Voidbringers as destroyers

Voidbringers

The mythic enemy of storytelling.

Voidbringers: the things children are told stole heaven.

The Oathpact: ten ancient figures bound in a circle

The Oathpact

The Heralds' ancient oath. Abandoned in all but Taln.

Oathpact: nine walk away. One remains bound.

Stormlight glowing in gems and spheres

Stormlight

Something Kaladin can take into his body.

Kaladin inhales . The light goes into him.

Spren gathering in wind and stormlight

Spren

The world's habit of growing spirits wherever feeling or force collects.

Spren: little spirits. , , and the rest.

Windspren as ribbons of light in the air

Windspren

Harmless weather-spirits. Syl first presents as one.

Windspren: tricksters in the air. Syl looks like one.

A highstorm's stormwall crossing the Plains

Highstorm

Clock, executioner, and battery for the world.

Highstorm: hide or die. left out come back glowing.

A figure glowing with Stormlight mid-Lashing

Surgebinding

The Radiants' art.

drinks light and rewrites gravity.

A Lashing pulling a body along a new down

Lashings

The practical kit of Szeth's -work.

Basic: you fall another way. Reverse: things fall toward you. Full: things stick.

A Knight Radiant in glowing Shardplate, full figure

Knights Radiant

What the Almighty's visions want Dalinar to look at.

Starfalls: they fly, they glow, they hold the line.

A Soulcaster turning an object to another material

Soulcasting

Strategic magic: food, stone, and emergency doors. Also Shallan's reason for approaching Jasnah.

Soulcasting: turn rock to smoke. Jasnah does it with a on her hand.

Fabrial settings and infused gemstones

Fabrials

The respectable, engineered cousin of old magic.

: trap a , get a machine.

A Shardblade forming from mist after ten heartbeats

Ten heartbeats

The difference between a Blade in hand and a dead man still reaching.

Ten heartbeats. Then the mist takes shape.

Dalinar's camp run to the Codes

The Codes

Dalinar's public eccentricity. The other treat them as a museum piece.

: Dalinar's rulebook. Everyone else drinks.

The Thrill as a red battle-haze

The Thrill

The feeling Alethi war is built on. Dalinar's loss of it is one reason they call him old.

The Thrill: joy of the fight. Dalinar's is going quiet.

The king and a highprince arguing over command of the war

Highprince of War

Dalinar's plan for unity. The other hear 'tyrant'.

of War: one man running the war. Refused.

Cutting a gemheart from a chasmfiend

Gemhearts

The prize. Armies die for the time it takes to cut one out.

: the chasmfiend's fortune, sitting in its chest.

A chasmfiend hunt on the Shattered Plains

Chasmfiend hunts

The daily shape of the war on the Plains.

Hunt the chrysalis, not the capital. That is the war.

The Shin assassin in white clothing

Assassin in white

The spark of the Vengeance Pact.

White clothes. . Gavilar dead.

Legendary city of Urithiru in the mountains

Urithiru

The place in the vision want Dalinar to come to. He never gets there.

Urithiru: the Radiants' city. Lost, or never real.

Also catalogued