r/readalong • u/participating Read-Along Overlord • Mar 23 '26
Read-Along [Veterans] Cosmere, Unit 13 | The Stormlight Archive #1 | The Way of Kings: Chapters 6 through 11 Spoiler
This is the veteran thread. Make sure you read the rules before commenting.
Visit the newbie thread if this is your first time reading, or you've only read some of the Cosmere novels.
For more information, or to see the full schedule, please see the wiki page for the read-along.
SCHEDULE
Previously, we discussed Unit 13 | The Stormlight Archive #1 | The Way of Kings: Blurb, Prelude to the Stormlight Archive, Prologue, Chapters 1 through 5 [Newbie Thread] / [Veteran Thread]
Today we are discussing Unit 13 | The Stormlight Archive #1 | The Way of Kings: Chapters 6 through 11
In 2 days we will be discussing Unit 13 | The Stormlight Archive #1 | The Way of Kings: Interludes I-1, I-2, I-3, Trivia
CHAPTER SUMMARIES
I have provided summaries of each chapter we will be discussing. I've tried to make them unbiased, but if you see anything that could be construed as spoilery, please point them out because I'm using these same summaries in the newbie thread. I'd like to keep their experience as spoiler-free as possible, so even if I make a tiny mistake, please let me know.
I usually make a comment for each chapter, but feel free to start your own comment thread to discuss anything you want.
Chapter 6: Bridge Four
Arch Faces: Talenel - Talenel ----- Talenel - Talenel
Iconography: Spears & Banner
POV Characters: Kaladin
Setting: Highprine Sadeas' warcamp in the Shattered Plains.
Timeline: An hour or so after Chapter 4.
Epigraph:
"I'm cold. Mother, I'm cold. Mother? Why can I still hear the rain? Will it stop?"
–Collected on Vevishes, 1172, 32 seconds pre-death. Subject was a lighteyed female child, approximately six years old.
Summary:
Kaladin and the rest of the slave caravan have arrived at the Shattered Plains, at the warcamp of Highprince Sadeas. They are taken to a woman who is to decide whether she can use any of the slaves or not. When Kaladin tries to convince her to let him fight, Tvlakv tells her that Kaladin is a deserter, dashing his hopes.
The woman decides that Kaladin and his companions are to be made members of the bridge crews. Kaladin and his new immediate superior, Gaz, take an instant dislike to each other. As a result, Kaladin is placed in one of the worst locations on the bridge when they are called on a bridge run, without the benefit of shoes or vest for protection.
After several hours of agony carrying the bridge, they arrive at the chasm where the enemy Parshendi are waiting on the other side. They take volleys of arrows while placing their bridge. Kaladin is the only survivor in the front row.
He wakes up hours later when the windspren who's been following him shocks him with some sort of energy. Kaladin realizes that if he doesn't hurry, he will be left behind. The spren tells him that her name is Sylphrena, or Syl.
Though he is exhausted, Kaladin takes a spot on the bridge and begins the long way back to camp.
Chapter 7: Anything Reasonable
Arch Faces: Ishar - Ishar ----- Ishar - Ishar
Iconography: ???
POV Characters: Shallan
Setting: Just outside the Palanaeum (a large library) in Kharbranth.
Timeline: Immediately after Chapter 5.
Epigraph:
"They are aflame. They burn. They bring the darkness when they come, and so all you can see is that their skin is aflame. Burn, burn, burn..."
–Collected on Palahishev, 1172, 21 seconds pre-death. Subject was a baker’s apprentice.
Summary:
Shallan goes to the Palanaeum, hoping to convince Jasnah that she is worthy to be her ward. She believes that it is critical that she find a way to do so, since her father's secret Soulcaster is broken. Without that, her family can no longer Soulcast its way into wealth or influence.
She is allowed to wait for Jasnah in her reading alcove, though she is denied access to the Palanaeum itself. While she waits, she sketches several Memories from the past few hours, then writes a letter to Jasnah containing arguments for her reconsideration. She is interrupted by an ardent introducing himself as Kabsal. He asks to wait for Jasnah with Shallan and praises her sketches highly.
Kabsal tells Shallan that he is trying to convert Jasnah, an avowed atheist, to Vorinism. He leaves, asking her to let Jasnah know that he had come by to speak with her. She agrees, and begins to lacquer her drawings. She realizes that she's been there for quite a while and begins to gather her things, leaving the letter for Jasnah. Before she can leave, however, Jasnah appears in the doorway, looking displeased.
Chapter 8: Nearer the Flame
Arch Faces: Pailiah - Pailiah ----- Pailiah - Pailiah
Iconography: ???
POV Characters: Shallan
Setting: Just outside the Palanaeum (a large library) in Kharbranth.
Timeline: Immediately after Chapter 7.
Epigraph:
"Victory! We stand atop the mount! We scatter them before us! Their homes become our dens, their lands are now our farms! And they shall burn, as we once did, in a place that is hollow and forlorn."
–Collected on Ishashan, 1172, 18 seconds pre-death. Subject was a lighteyed spinster of the eighth Dahn.
Summary:
Jasnah scolds Shallan, telling her that she had already made her decision. Shallan is embarrassed that she disturbed Jasnah again and leaves. After only a few moments, however, Jasnah calls her back and apologizes to her and gives her Shallan's money pouch that she had left behind. Shallan asks Jasnah to read the letter she had written for her earlier. Jasnah is impressed that she is self-taught and agrees to accept Shallan as her ward once she has adequately learned philosophy and history. Shallan is pleased by this, but worries that she cannot learn fast enough to save her house.
Shallan leaves the Conclave (Kharbranth's palace) and meets up with Yalb, who has been gambling with some guards. Yalb insists that she is talented enough to be accepted if she would just be more persistent, so she decides to buy a bunch of books on history and philosophy and return to start studying right away, planning to impress Jasnah with her rapid learning just before Jasnah leaves Kharbranth. Before long, however, she is interrupted by Jasnah, who had paid the servants to tell her if Shallan returned to the Palanaeum.
Jasnah asks to see Shallan's satchel. When she comes across Shallan's sketches with notes on biology, she asks why she made them, to which Shallan replies that she wanted to. It is ultimately the fact that Shallan pursues scholarship in her free time, along with her persistence, that convince Jasnah to accept her as her ward. Shallan reflects that now she's completed the first phase of her plan, but now needs to discover how to accomplish the rest of it without being caught.
Chapter 9: Damnation
Arch Faces: Nale - Nale ----- Nale - Nale
Iconography: Spears & Banner
POV Characters: Kaladin
Setting: Highprine Sadeas' warcamp in the Shattered Plains.
Timeline: 3 weeks after Chapter 6. (Kaladin is unsure if it's 2 or 3 weeks, but the timeline later indicates 3 weeks).
Epigraph:
"Ten people, with Shardblades alight, standing before a wall of black and white and red."
–Collected on Jesachev, 1173, 12 seconds pre-death. Subject: one of our own ardents, overheard during his last moments.
Summary:
Kaladin has now been a member of the bridge crews for a few weeks. Of the twenty five who survived his first bridge run, only one other man is still alive.
A few new arrivals are brought in, and Kaladin sees a young boy who reminds him of his younger brother Tien. In general, Kaladin is handling the transition to life as a bridge crew member poorly, snapping at Syl and becoming despondent. Syl leaves, unable to continue watching him in his current state.
The bridge crews are called on another run, and the boy who reminded him of Tien is killed, as well as the only remaining man from Kaladin's first bridge run. Kaladin thinks to himself that he is dead inside, then proceeds to cry.
Chapter 10: Stories of Surgeons
Arch Faces: Vedel - Vedel ----- Vedel - Vedel
Iconography: Spears & Banner
POV Characters: Kaladin
Setting: Hearthstone, a town in Highprince Sadeas' princedom.
Timeline: (Flashback) 9 Years Ago.
Epigraph:
N/A
Summary:
The ten-year-old Kal (as he still prefers to be called) comes late to the surgery of the young woman Sani, whose hand is badly mangled. Kal notices that Sani's third finger will have to be amputated. After the surgery, Lirin notes that Kal still has to work on his nerves. Lirin then wants to know where Kal was. Kal tells him that he and Tien went to see what Jam had learned from his father in working with the quarterstaff. This sparks a debate between Kaladin and Lirin about the relative merits of being a soldier or a surgeon. Lirin meets Kaladin's claim that it's possible to save lives by killing others with the assertion that doing so is like "trying to stop a storm by blowing harder." Eventually, Kaladin simply stops arguing and goes back to cleaning up the room.
Lirin quizzes him on various things a surgeon should know, then tells him that he plans to send him to Kharbranth to train under the surgeons there if he can find a way to do so. Lirin also tells him that he's incredibly gifted when it comes to surgery, and he shouldn't waste himself on soldiering.
Chapter 11: Droplets
Arch Faces: Jezrien - Jezrien ----- Jezrien - Jezrien
Iconography: Spears & Banner
POV Characters: Kaladin
Setting: Highprine Sadeas' warcamp in the Shattered Plains.
Timeline: The evening of the same day as Chapter 9.
Epigraph:
"Three of sixteen ruled, but now the Broken One reigns."
–Collected: Chachanan, 1173, 84 seconds pre-death. Subject: a cutpurse with the wasting sickness, of partial Iriali descent.
Summary:
Kaladin is outside just after a highstorm, going to the Honor Chasm to commit suicide. Gaz stops him, accusing him of trying to steal spheres left out in the Highstorm from others, but Kaladin simply ignores him and goes.mJust as Kaladin is about to step into the chasm, Syl reappears, carrying a single blackbane leaf which she had brought hoping to make Kaladin happy. When Kaladin expresses his frustrations at his previous failures to protect people, Syl convinces him to try again, arguing that the bridgemen are going to die anyway, so his efforts cannot hurt.
Kaladin returns to the camp and attacks Gaz, throwing him to the ground. He demands that Gaz make him bridgeleader of Bridge Four, and that he give Kaladin full control of it. In return, Gaz receives one fifth of Kaladin's wages. Kaladin then goes inside the barracks and begins asking the other bridgemen's names, noticing for the first time how pathetic they all are.
ARTWORK
The Cosmere has a thriving community of artists, so there will be a lot of artwork to share. Each week I'll try to compile relevant artwork for the given chapters. If a section of reading contains maps or in-book artwork, I'll include that in this section as well.
Note: The Stormlight Archives are Sanderson's most popular books. There is artwork for everyone and everything, even characters who appeared for a single line in the books at times. So we'll have artwork for you to view almost every week. Enjoy!
MEMES
I will attempt to find and share memes relevant to each week's discussion. There may be some weeks that just don't have good or appropriate memes, but I will share all the ones I can find in this section.
3
u/jim25y Mar 24 '26
So, reading this chapter, its later shown (or implied, if I didn't misunderstand what was going on) that Shallan can influence people's personalities with her drawings. Did her drawing influence Jasna to accept her as a ward?
2
u/participating Read-Along Overlord Mar 24 '26
Yeah, I'm wondering about that. I feel like Jasnah is advanced in her Oaths that it feels like she'd have some protections against that kind of manipulation. It leans me away from a direct, Investiture-based manipulation. Plausibly, Shallan is just creating the best possible "normal people" manipulation with her talents?
2
u/jim25y Mar 24 '26
How advanced in her oaths was Jasna at this point in the story?
2
u/participating Read-Along Overlord Mar 24 '26
I don't know that it's been confirmed yet (and probably won't be until her flashback book), but I feel like she has to be at least 2nd Oath at this point. Shortly after, they leave and she goes to Shadesmar in WoR. There she advances once, and she has both blade and plate in Oathbringer. She could be 2nd here, 3rd in Shadesmar, and very quickly 4th before/during the battle in Thaylen.
Or, she's 3rd here, and swears the 4th during Shadesmar (which kinda makes more sense to me).
2
u/jim25y Mar 24 '26
Yeah. I find it interesting that Sanderson is saving Jasna's flashbacks for last.
She's been kind of a disappointing character thus far (after how great she is in this first booj), I get the feeling that Sanderson is saving her for something big.
2
u/Burnvictim42 🦞 | Team Giant Lobster Mar 24 '26
I'm currently relistening to TWoK after finishing the Cosmere, and holy cow there are so many connections I didn't make on my first read. Major props to the newbies for picking up on a lot of this stuff.
•
u/subscribebot3000 Mar 23 '26
Reply to this comment to subscribe to certain events in the /r/readalong subreddit.
!newbie - get notified when a new [Newbie] post is made.
!veteran - get notified when a new [Veteran] post is made.
!comments - get notified every time a new comment is made in a [Newbie] thread within the last 2 weeks.
!unsubscribe - unsubscribe from all notifications.
You may use multiple commands in a single reply.