WMG / Wax and Wayne

Trell is Odium going by an alias

Mostly because his servants that we see in The Bands of Mourning show the same signs of possession as those affected by Voidspren: glowing red eyes.

• Miles' eyes glow gold and red in Wax and Wayne, as well. However, while gold is Odium's color, but Word of Brandon says that red is the color of corrupted investiture from any shard, rather than Odium specifically.
  • Jossed. Trell is the name Autonomy took on pre-lord-ruler Scadrial.

Trell is Bavadin/Autonomy going by an alias

As per Word of Brandon:

• Bleeder's spiker is from a Shard we already knew as of 2015.
• "Trell has been many things over the eons..."
• Bavadin has a lot of personas, of both sexes."This won't be relevant for a long while, but as a service to the community, let me say this: try not to get too hung up on gender, race, or even human appearance where Bavadin is concerned. There are some peoples who worship entire pantheons where every member is actually her."
• We have seen her influence in other worlds.
• Brandon was cagey about whether Trell was Autonomy when asked directly.
• Trell is seen on Taldain in White Sand Volume 2, which is where Autonomy has set up.
• And finally, in Arcanum Unbound, the essay on Taldain says that Autonomy interferes with other planets.
  • Confirmed.

By this point in history, Odium has merged with the remains of Honor to become Nemesis

The events of the The Stormlight Archive are obviously leading to him being kicked off Roshar, freeing him from a cycle of Eternal Recurrence to menace the rest of the Cosmere. We know Odium is terrified of Sazed, since he holds two shards, so the first thing he's likely to do is go after him. The fact that Miles Hundredlives died with a Death Rattle is confirmation of this since it means Moelach, a powerful Voidspren, is metaphysically nearby. Further, agents of a foreign shard are trying to dethrone Harmony. The only trouble is that Miles referred to the agents of the shard as 'The Men of Red and Gold.' Odium is only associated with Red...which means that he probably gave in and picked up the power of one of the shards he killed to fight Harmony on an even footing.

• This seems to go against Odium's M.O. He's Splintered every Shard he's come across (save for Cultivation, and not for lack of trying, I'd wager), and he does so specifically to avoid contaminating the Intent of his Shard. Taking on bits of Honor, assuming it's possible in the first place, doesn't seem like the natural place to start with such a deviation.
  • Partly, Honor is right there for him to grab. And it's actually less of a change to his nature than many other already shattered shards would be. You can hate your enemy and still be honorable about how you confront them, for example. But if he picked up Dominion, he'd have to rule what he hates. That leaves him as trapped as he is now, since he'd be compelled to create an oppressive regime as close to hell on earth as possible and stick around to administer it. Sure it'd make him the Devil, but that's not actually useful to his goals. And picking up Devotion would just make his head explode. Cultivation is possible, but we don't know if she is actually dead or will die before the end of the series.
  • But any change to Odium's nature would be abhorrent to him. There's no room for lesser evils here, not when we're speaking of Shardic Intent. Look at Ruin's behavior, back in the original trilogy - do you think he would pick up any Shard because "it's less of a change to his nature than it could be?"
    • Ruin's goal wasn't evil, it was destruction. Ruin's bearer was a kind and generous man, and since his Shard made him see destruction as beautiful he wanted to share it with everyone. He could have taken on any number of shards without conflicting that nature: Devotion springs most readily to mind, or Cultivation. Similarly the goal of Odium's shard isn't evil, it's Hatred. The shard just wants to hate, and it makes it's bearer hate everything. It's up to them what they do with that. And Odium hates and fears Harmony, so he'll need an edge. Even if Harmony is inexperienced after only 300 years, he still has a huge amount of raw power that Odium can't match.
    • That's not my point. I'm saying that Odium taking on any mind-altering powers would be out of character. 2013 Reddit AMA, question 8: "Odium is by its nature selfish, however, and the combination of it and Rayse makes for an entity that fears an additional power would destroy it and make it into something else." And if there's one power in the Cosmere that changes your persona, it's taking up a Shard.
    • More to the point, Wax and Wayne takes place shortly before TSA.
    • Actually, Wax And Wayne takes place between Stormlights 5 and 6 (there's a nice 15-year In-Universe time skip planned between the two), so suspecting Odium is not entirely out of the question.

Whoever writes the Allomancer Jak serial knows far more then they're letting on

On first glance, the Allomancer Jak serial seems to be completely fabricated pulp adventure. And they may well be...except that they include all sorts of odd details that are confirmed by background information from the main series. The idea that humans can become Koloss (and that the Koloss still know how to do this) is entirely plausible. But very few people knew that Koloss were created by Hemalurgy even during the Final Empire. Jak mentions a 'secret feruchemic art' that his Terris sidekick used to befriend the Koloss, which seems like an outright Ass Pull...except that we later learn about Connector ferrings. He mentions he has had some devices (special boots with spring compartments) made by Ranette, who is both reclusive and not well known outside of very particular circles.All in all, these stories show a REALLY odd level of in-universe Shown Their Work for such a generally overwrought and pulpy story. You have to wonder who wrote it, why they are so knowledgeable, and even whether some or all of the stories are true.

• What's more, all the information is stuff that wouldn't be normally available to an in-universe perspective. The reference to Hemalurgic creation of koloss is knowledge that Harmony actively detests - a rare descriptor nowadays, when Harmony is juggling two diametrically opposed Intents which combined push him toward inaction. The Connecter ferring ability a) requires an expensive metal and b) is rather difficult to identify if one wasn't specifically looking for it. Even the reference to Ranette falls under this - if someone knows she exists, they also know how she feels about visitors, so it comes off as something thrown in to make Jak look good (especially if the spring-loaded boots were tossed in to get Jak out of a bind and then not mentioned before or since). If they don't know she exists, then she comes off as a plot device.
• It gets better after reading Bands of Mourning. Connection (as seen in the first Allomancer Jak story) is described as working in a surprisingly similar way to how it works with the Southern coin-metalminds in Bands of Mourning (and speculated on by VenDell). This means the writer of Jak, whom was writing a few years before these closely guarded secrets were revealed to Wax and co., somehow got this from the the secretive Terris, VenDell, or the Southerners. This all seems quite odd...
• Except: If the writer is Kelsier. Why? At the very least, he would know how Connection works. It's also probable that he would also understand how Koloss are made (and, as hinted at by the end of Secret History, he has an in depth understanding of Hemalurgy by Era 2). One can imagine him at least learning about Ranette, too, considering how good he is at finding secrets. Finally, Kelsier has enough of an elevated ego that one could see him creating a pulp fiction series about his exploits in his free time and just for the hell of it...because it's Kelsier.
• Possible evidence that Jak is Kelsier:
  • He survives lots of things that should have left him severely injured, such as jumping into rapids on several occasions. Easy if you have pewter or a goldmind.
  • Handerwym repeatedly lampshades how his claims make no sense, like how he licks tin off a cave wall when veins of pure tin are unlikely. It's possible that he's using his Mistborn abilities and covering it up with bad excuses; Jak allegedly used the tin to find a hidden river, which Kelsier could have found using his powerful Steelsight. Skeptics wouldn't think he's a Mistborn, they'd just think he's either lying, hallucinating, or an idiot.
  • There's also how he lifts the Survivor's Treasure: he blows air into a balloon attached to the chest, which lifts it up to the surface. Handerwym points out that a single lungful of air shouldn't have lifted a chest full of metal spikes, but he did witness the chest surfacing. If the theory that Kelsier is using a Mistwraith's body is true, then he could have filled his body with air beforehand, which is why he needed the rock to sink. Or since he constructed the Bands of Mourning with all Feruchemical powers, that means he already has those powers without the Bands, and he could have used the one that grants extra breath. Or if he really did place the treasure there, he could have set up a different release mechanism (maybe with an already inflated balloon kept submerged by a bunch of rocks, or with an unsealed metalmind for oxygen) and lied to the broadsheets about how he did it.
  • Jak is also known for being a dandy, and all his appearances show him wearing glasses and long hair; High-Class Gloves and gentleman's suits can cover his arms, sunglasses can cover his spiked eye, and the long hair can hide the point. And it wouldn't be strange if he lost an eye, going on all those adventures.
  • This might not be canon yet, but in the preview to The Lost Metal, Wayne's mother tells him a story about Allomancer Jak when Wayne is eleven, treating him like a folk hero. Wayne is in his late thirties/early forties during the events of the books and Jak is still active(ly defying death). If Jak was thirty when this tale is told (starting out at twenty and ten years to become a legend like Wax), he'd be in his sixties. He'd be too old to continue his high-risk lifestyle... unless he's already immortal.

Bloody Tam's goal was to cause Wax enough emotional trauma to damage his soul

In The Stormlight Archive we learned that souls can be damaged by emotional trauma, but it needs to be pretty severe. Killing your mother and father or years of depression and survivor's guilt are good examples...and so would accidentally killing your wife. Why would someone want to do this? A damaged soul leaves you open to control by emotional allomancy, as seen with the Hemalurgic races from the original trilogy. Someone wanted to make it possible to control Wax like a puppet when the time was right. Alternately, someone with a great deal more knowledge about The Cosmere wanted him to bond with a spirit.

Chromium or Bendalloy Mistings will be used in the future to allow faster than light travel

Because the temporal distortion effect they create is very similar to what you see at high relativistic speeds. It wouldn't be a stretch to say that they are altering the local speed of light in addition to their effects on time, making them a living warp drive. The rest is just figuring out propulsion.

• In addition, bullets moving through a speed bubble barrier ricochet at unpredictable angles. If one can make a bubble large enough for that to happen to a spacebound vessel, and control the ricochet, well.

Aluminum and Duralumin Gnats aren't as useless as everyone thinks they are

It's just that their powers aren't usually very useful on Scadriel. Aluminum Gnats can purge their system of magical influence, and Duralumin Gnats can radically amplify any magical influence on them by burning it out. But there aren't very many powers on Scadriel that actually affect another human. You can probably burn aluminum to become immune to emotional allomancy, and to drop out of time altering fields, and burning Duralumin would enhance those same effects. But that's about it.In the Cosmere as a whole, however, MANY powers can effect living beings and would interact with these powers in interesting ways. For example, they would be immune to the mind-reading predators from Sixth of Dusk and probably the touch of Shades from Shadows of Silence in the Forests of Hell. It might even let them cancel any surgebindings placed on them. They just haven't had a chance to properly demonstrate in in the series as a whole, and none of this has been discovered because it would require odd circumstances and alluminum is too valuable to burn in useless experiments.

• Corollary: the absolute price per unit is not the sole restricting factor in testing this theory. Given the speed at which aluminum burning is shown to eat through metal supplies when Vin is forced to burn it (she notices her entire metal supply, aluminum included, metabolizes nearly instantly), it would make more sense to get the anti-Riot and anti-Soothe benefits of aluminum in a more renewable and long-term manner by simply using the aluminum foil hats shown in the series. At the near-instantaneous speed aluminum seems to burn, any shielding it might provide to an allomancer would burn out too quickly to be useful against emotional allomancy which is also applied as a steady pressure over time. Copper's useful as a shield not only because it's (relatively) cheap and affects a wider area, but because it burns slowly over a long period of time.

Alluminum Gnats can drop out of time fields, Durallumin Gnats can amplify them

This is based on the fact that burning Alluminum purges your body of all magical influence, and assumes that being in an area of altered time counts as magical influence. This would let a Durallumin Gnat hugely accelerate themselves in the area of a slider, and put themselves in stasis in the area of a pulser. Meanwhile an Alluminum Gnat can act normally in a pulser field (creating an otherwise impossible Time Stands Still effect) and a slider bubble.Definitely seems like a setup for an otherwise useless power to be great in combination with another, and potentially even game breaking. There are probably odd interactions with other time stopped objects to prevent Alumminum Gnat/Pulser being an instant win condition, but it could do very interesting things.

Bloody Tan had a Hemalurgic spike

Bloody Tan can somehow move fast enough to shift Lessie into the path of Wax's bullet, either through Feruchemy or Allomancy, but Wax gives no indication that Bloody Tan had any powers. He also claims to have seen Death and that "Someone else moves us." Both are references to Marsh. Marsh spiked Bloody Tan, then used duralumin enhanced emotional allomancy to take control of him to ensure Lessie's death. But why, you ask, would Marsh want Lessie dead? To ensure that Wax goes back to Elendel to stop the Vanishers. Marsh wagers that Wax wouldn't leave the Roughs as long as his wife was there, so he removed her from the equation.

• He's probably crazy enough that his soul is broken (as in Stormlight Archives) so he doesn't need a spike to be controlled. It could explain his reflexes though. But he could also just be that good, or be an electrum savant: you don't need to see the future perfectly to make an educated guess.
• He also refers to himself (and everyone) as puppets, which would fit him being controlled by either means. But if a generally broken soul (as opposed to one broken by hemalurgy) lets you be controlled by emotional allomancy then there could be another reason: whoever was behind Tam wanted to break Wax's soul too, by having him kill his wife, which leaves him open to control as well.

Wax's earring is a Hemalurgic spike

It gives him a direct path to speak to Harmony (who normally gives vague advice because his attention is elsewhere), in addition, it gives him the ability to burn Pewter. He never tries to do so actively, so he doesn't even know, but on misty nights when he has his earring in, such as at the climax, he draws in the mists themselves for extra vitality and energy to keep going despite massive injuries. This is possible only because Ruin and Preservation are merged into one being, hence the spike not preventing the mists from entering him.

• I've just come home from Brandon's book signing here in Vancouver, and I asked him what the earring was made of, he wouldn't tell me what metal it's made of, but he DID say it has a slight hemalurgic charge.

• My theory is that it's a re-used Koloss spike and the bind point in the ear gives only minimal effects. It seems that all of Harmony's worshipers have one, and there's no way he murders enough people to make new ones, but there's literally over a million left over, and even if only one of the four spikes is suited for this use that's still a lot of spikes.
  • Actually he wrote in my book that it's part of a re-used Inquisitor spike that was melted down and reforged. You could get a lot of little earrings from those great big spikes in the Inquisitors.
  • In general, being pierced with metal should let Harmony speak with his followers borrowing Ruin's old power. They might not require a hemalurgic charge for that, since metal itself is invested in this world.

Wax's earring was given to him by a Faceless Immortal: TenSoon

Because, why not?

• haha it was actually given to him by MeLaan (not sure of spelling) according to Word of Brandon.

Bloody Tan is an Atium Misting

He managed to move Lessie into position for the bullet to hit her head. Short of steel compounding, Atium is pretty much the only way to do that, and if he were compounding steel he'd presumably have enough left to dodge. Atium, however, could do it and burns quickly enough he could easily have run out. Furthermore, it would help explain how he murdered the dude posed as flying, presumably a Coinshot, despite allegedly only using knives. Now, you might object that all the Atium is gone and the Pits are non-functional, but Kelsier said he'd ended Atium production for "hundreds of years" and it's been hundreds of years since then.

• This has now been Jossed as of Brandon's Q&A on Twitter. He did say that asking if he as a Seer was a good question though, which makes me think there's definitely more going on there then is obvious.
• It was stated that Blood Tan stole a shipment of Bendalloy, so I assumed that he was a Slider and altered time a bit to move her into the shot. What exactly did the Q & A say on the subject, exactly?
  • Except that a Slider bubble would have altered the trajectory of the shot. Electrum's far more likely - he "sees" his Electrum shadow get shot it the head, and moves Lessie so that she'll be in the path between the gun and that spot instead.
  • Not necessarily - Tan could have put a bubble up, moved Lessie, and dropped the bubble before the bullet hit the edge. Wax does something similar against Tarson.

Any bullet that kills someone by being fired into their heart becomes a hemalurgic spike

OK, not any bullet, it has to be of an appropriate metal such as the steel ones that Wax uses. Steel bullets would steal Allomantic physical powers, Aluminum bullets steal Allomantic enhancement powers. Let's just hope no one finds out.

• Well we know the heart is an appropriate point to drive a spike through to steal the ability to burn steel, as Ruin tried to get Spook to impale Beldre through the heart to get another spike in him, so that definitely works. And yeah, that could get messy.
• I've asked at a book signing and the verdict from Word of God is that it would not matter so much where the bullet hits so long as it does kill.
• He's flip-flopped on the question of whether non-lethal Hemalurgy is possible, but regardless, the desire to do Hemalurgy must remain. So a bullet wouldn't steal power unless the shooter wanted them to.

Bloodmakers can be killed with a single bullet to the heart

All you would need is the correct metal to hemalurgically steal their ability to heal. It just depends on whether they need to be dead for the bullet/spike to steal the piece of their soul, it's a bit of a chicken and egg scenario. Perhaps it won't work until the bloodmaker runs out of healing anyway.

• Word of God says that a single bullet 'could' kill by stealing the healing ability. He said that death is normally a prerequisite of stealing a power so a blood maker who is still healing should be immune, but the bullet will still damage the soul and interrupt the healing. Basically it could work by cheating.
• That's REALLY useful to know (and would have been really useful to know when dealing with Miles too, along with the fact that aluminum stops bloodmakers from healing while it's in the wound). So it looks like what you want for this kind of thing are bullets of gold (ironic) or Atium? This definitely sounds like a lead-in too a "Man With the Golden Gun" shout out...
  • For that matter, an Atium bullet (which is the kind of thing that's valuable enough to track down after you use it...) would keep on picking up various abilities from everyone it killed. Atium can steal ANY ability after all. And then someone gets shot with it but it lodges in their body and they don't die...
  • There still needs to be the intent to use Hemalurgy with it though, otherwise the powers don't transfer in or out of the spike. Ruin got around that by facilitating the process personally wherever he could.

Wax's sister is a Connector / Duralumin Ferring

Duralumin stores one's spiritual connection with others, reducing other people's awareness and friendship with them while storing. Wax notes that he never had a close relationship with his sister, but when she is revealed to be alive in the epilogue, he feels notably relieved.

• Note that "while storing" thing. If Wax's sister was a Duralumin Ferring the kidnappers would have had to have let her keep a duraluminmind with her the whole time. Not to mention, how would she know to stop storing when her brother found out she was still alive?
• Maybe she was aware of his uncle's plans and was storing up her connection to him so that he wouldn't be drawn into the plot as well. Then, when they took away her duraluminmind, his connection came back at full force.
• First, her being able to keep her duralumin minds isn't that much of a stretch. Feruchemy lets you generate a Charm Person effect with duralumin in addition to actively making yourself forgettable. So if the inconsistency is because of her feruchemy, it could either be because she needed the connection for something else or to keep Wax out of it.
• The sudden spike of relief for finding out his sister is okay, which even Wax notes as unusual at the time, is most likely due to his uncle being an emotional allomancer and Rioting his relief. Presumably his sister, who 'died' along with his uncle, is in on the conspiracy. The goal was to make him miss his sister and then use her to help bring her into the conspiracy.

Hoid is dead by the time Alloy Of Law happens.

We don't know the relative timeframe of the other Cosmere books so far, so it's possible that they all fall within a normal lifespan. Alloy Of Law is explicitly set 300 years after to original Mistborn trilogy, and it's the only one with no mention of Hoid.

• Per Word of God, Alloy takes place somewhat before Way of Kings, so Hoid is definitely still alive. Word of God has also said that he's lived longer than a normal human lifetime. Check out 17thshard.com for a place where you can find links to a lot of this background info, mostly in interviews.
  • Also, the scruffy guy in black at the wedding dinner was Hoid, he wasn't as involved in events this time as what's going on in Alloy isn't really that important to the overall story, he's basically just there for the cameo and so that the people at 17thshard didn't drive themselves nuts looking for him.
• Since Hoid is confirmed to have been present at the Shattering of Adonalsium, which according to word of Brandon happened thousands of years in the past, then he has some form of immortality (and given his presence in the Liar of Partinel, may well be the oldest living being in the universe). So no, he would not be dead even if he wasn't present in the book.
• Jossed: Hoid makes an appearance in Shadows of Self.

Nicrosil's Feruchemical use.

A Twinborn can store their ability to use Allomancy in a nicrosilmind, denying themselves their Allomantic power during storage; tapping the metalmind temporarily enhances the amount of power the Allomancer gets from burning the same amount of metal, in a similar fashion as a Hemolurgic spike of the appropriate metal. Much like bendalloyminds can store either food or water, using nicrosil to store Feruchemical talent is also possible, increasing the amount of an attribute the Feruchemist can store in a given quantity of metal.

This, of course, makes Soulbearer Ferrings as useless as Aluminum and Duralumin Mistings. And before you give yourself a headache trying to figure out how a Feruchemist can store their ability to use Feruchemy in a metalmind using their Feruchemy, keep in mind that somewhere in the middle of The Well of Ascension, Sazed mentions that while Feruchemists can't fill most metalminds in their sleep, they can still store wakefulness in a bronzemind.

• Nicrosil's Feruchemical use is outlined in the RPG as storing "Investiture", outlined there as being straight up supernatural energy - to the point that it can be added in equal or lesser measure to the energy being tapped from any other sort of metalmind. It can also be used to convert the stores in another Feruchemist's metalmind into Investiture, but this apparently reduces the total store in that metalmind. As for how they store their ability to use Feruchemy by using Feruchemy, while filling a Nicrosilmind they can't use their other metalminds at all - so they store everything but the ability to stop storing to the Nicrosil mind. What effect this has in Twinborn, both those who are or are not Nicro-Compounders, is a very interesting question.
• It probably lets you store up your power and then really push it later if you're twinborn. But I'd say it's unlikely they're completely useless. In another story we have Biochroma, where investiture is intrinsic to humans on that planet. If they have more they become healthier (physically and mentally), stronger, and eventually immortal.
  • Similarly, being infused with investiture on Roshar leads to heightened physical and mental perfection. On that world a Soulbearer ferring who also happened to be a Radiant could hold Stormlight perfectly in arbitrary quantities, unlike others who leak. But since it probably takes truly absurd quantities of investiture to start having physical effects (thousands of Breaths from Warbreaker for example) it's not surprising we haven't seen this discovered this yet.

Tarson gained his Koloss blood from a Hemalurgic spike used by Koloss.

Koloss are made when the souls of five ordinary people are combined together through Hemalurgy. This is also what warps their body and turns them into Axe-Crazy killing machines that will die of natural causes within a decade. But that's with four spikes- what happens when you only use one? Koloss aren't invincible, and a group of well-armed men could hunt one down and harvest the spikes. Using one spike would only attach one soul to your own, which limit your strength increase, but also limit the physical and mental deterioration.

There is also a chance that Tarson is simply the first of many. We know that the Organization is trying to breed Mistings. They may also try to "breed" an army of Tarsons, which are a step up from an army of Koloss. They wouldn't be as strong as full-blooded Koloss, but they wouldn't require powerful Soothers or Rioters to control them, either.

• Though we know for a fact that Harmony/Sazed altered the koloss so they could procreate, who is to say he also didn't make it possible for them to procreate with humans? No one seems disbelieving of the idea of a person being "koloss-blooded", so it could very well be fairly common.
• Complicating this is the serial adventure story published in the newspaper (Allomancer Jack) which, which clearly exaggerated, also have hints that the author actually knows important things. For example, that humans can be transformed into Koloss through hemalurgy (references to koloss claiming to have been human, though Jack doesn't believe them) and that Connector ferrings exist (referred too as an obscure and sacred form of feruchemy which would be an outright ass pull in universe if we didn't know it actually exists). It could be that, as Harmony, Sazed IMPROVED on the orginal Koloss design so the alterations caused by hemalurgy are heritable and they aren't as insane.
• Wo B Cleared much of this up: Koloss can breed viable children, with grey skin and prodigious strength, but these children must make a decision to take up the spikes when they come of age. If they don't, they allowed to leave the Pits of Eltania for greener pastures. If they do, they become fully-grown koloss, and gain the strength and mass that are characteristic of such.

Hemalurgy has been altered by Harmony to be less lethal.

While I doubt Sazed approves of people shoving spikes into other people, at least two surviving races- the Kandra and the Koloss- require Hemalurgy for procreation. In order to let the Kandra survive without having to murder people, Harmony altered the requirements for for Hemalurgy- you no longer have to drive a spike through the heart to take some of their power. This way, the Kandra can find sympathetic Mistings and make a few more of each other every hundred years.

In a future book, the protagonists will figure this out, and split their powers- they will be much less powerful, but more versatile.

• According to Word of God, Harmony changed the koloss so they would be self-propagating. Chances are, he did the same thing to the kandra.
• Though, if we take the Allomancer Jack stories as reliable with a grain of salt (and there are hints the author actually knows more than the pulp nature of the story suggests), it's still possible for humans to become Koloss. Presumably this is through more hemalurgy, either the original that requires four deaths or an improved transformation of Sazed's own design.

• Jossed: In Bands Of Mourning, it's mentioned that the kandra can't make new Blessings, making the ones they have all the more precious.

The metals with unrevealed Hemalurgic powers cover the Functional Magic systems from other Shardworlds.

I'm not sure which metals go with which powers, but imagine a Steel Inquisitor Awakener who can use AonDor.

• This is confirmed by Word of God

The Organization's ultimate goal is to control the Pits of Hathsin

We know that the Pits survived the rebirth of Scadrial, and that Kelsier mentions their ability to produce atium was destroyed for three hundred years. Presumably, they need a Mistborn to get whoever's living there- probably kandra- out.

• The problem with this (and most other theories here dealing with atium) being, of course, the fact that Sazed/Harmony should have reabsorbed the part of Ruin's power that atium was the solid form of since the only thing preventing Ruin from doing so was Preservation hiding it (and Sazed/Harmony knows exactly where).
  • Actually, Sazed won't do that. Remember, the atium was the counterbalance to the power Preservation invested in humans. If Sazed were to reclaim it, his powers would become unbalanced, and he needs the balance to stay sane.
  • If they're trying to control the pits of hathsin, they'll run into competition from worldhopper societies: it's the best dimensional access point on Roshar, albeit one that's been shut down for centuries.

The cryptic last words of Miles Hundredlives were not his own.

When he died, whatever is speaking through dying people on Roshar also spoke through him.

• This is not my theory; somebody else brought it up at a signing and Sanderson got extremely cagey in response. So it's worth preserving here.
• If that's the case then that means that a Voidspren named Moelach is metaphysically nearby, though we haven't heard Death Rattles from anyone else yet. And that, in turn, would imply that the Shard interfering with Scardriel is Odium (who else)?

Ruin *could* read minds; he was being blocked by Preservation's power opposing him.

In the original trilogy, it's a major plot point that Ruin can't read minds, even of the most spike-filled Inquisitors. In this book, though, Harmony appears to respond directly to Wax's thoughts.

• Word of God indicates that this is a part of the "complimentary opposites" nature of these two powers, actually. Preservation could read minds, but had a very hard time communicating with them (remember how Vin had to struggle to get even a simple message to Elend?). Ruin was essentially the opposite, having no real ability to read minds but being very powerful at communicating with and influencing them. Harmony, having access to both powers, could do both.

Atium will return in the third trilogy.

If it is indeed a Crisis Crossver, that means Roshar will be involved. And if Roshar is involved, that means Soulcasting. You might need existing atium to use as a blueprint, and it might take prohibitive amounts of stormlight, but I see no other obstacles to turning things into atium.

• Jossed by Word of Brandon, Investiture interferes with Soulcasting and Atium and Lerasium are heavily Invested, so they can't be transmuted or created by Soulcasting. Doesn't mean Atium can't eventually return of course.

They're not trying to breed a Mistborn.

The assumption that Wax goes with, and most other people have followed, is that his uncle is involved in some scheme to breed new Mistborn. However, there's another thing that can be done that takes a lot of Mistings of varied abilities, and would be MUCH quicker. They're trying to make new Steel Inquisitors.

• the preview reading for Shadows of Self strongly implies this is the case.
• Why just women, then?
  • Plausibly, to throw people off from their true intentions.
  • Breeding more Mistings to make into Steel Inquisitors. Because my brain comes up with things like this: you can do it with just a seeker with a seeker hemalurgic spike (or any other allomancer) if they're sociopathic enough to go along with it. When a child with an allomantic bloodline is born, feed them samples of all metals and hurt them badly enough to make them snap. They will start instinctively burning metal, so you now know what ability they have to steal. Smokers can be detected either with a double-seeker made through hemalurgy (though this is risky since Harmony will be urging them to have an attack of conscience) or through having another burning allomancer who you watch for when you stop being able to sense them.

Paalm's Unknown Spike

We see Paalm take Bloody Tan's form at least a couple of times to screw with Wax in Shadows of Self. Which means that she ate him after the mess with her death as Lessie happened. And gained the hemalurgic spike that someone or something had put in him. My theory is that obtaining that spike contributed far more to her madness than the heartbreak over what happened to Wax and her anger at Harmony.

• That makes alot of sense, except that I would think Harmony would have noticed her getting an extra spike. Unless that was when the other shard began shrouding her from Harmony, at any rate.

Harmony is shrouding Scadriel from the rest of the Cosmere

Word of God on the map of Roshar's cognitive realm is that the region of mists is Scadriel. Since Sazed is concerned with free will, he is shrouding the Scadriel region of the cognitive realm in Preservation's power to prevent meddling by other Shards. And if he wasn't before, after the revelations of Shadows Of Self he almost certainly is now.

• Somewhat confirmed in Bands of Mourning: Harmony is actively warding off a hostile shard in the physical realm, but we have no indication what he is doing in the Cognitive.
• As of Mistborn Secret History: Scadrial's Cognitive Realm has always been misty.

Burning an alloy of Atium and Lerasium makes someone a Feruchemist, as will burning the metallic manifestation of Harmony

Feruchemy is an emergent property of Ruin and Preservation's power, so an alloy of those two powers should make someone a feruchemist.

The Broadsheet Story about creatures from another world was true

That was a pretty clear description of a Shardpool, which we know work as means of dimensional travel. The creature she saw was an agent of the new Shard interfering on Scadrial.

• Seems plausible. That drawing, presumably from the witness' description, did bear an uncanny resemblance to the descriptions of the Parshendi...
• Alternatively, it was one of the Hunters from the southern lands using a shardpool to worldhop.
• It's someone from the South.

The unknown metal the "cursed spike" is made of is trellium

It is also the metal that powers southener magitek. It is the solid state of investiture from the shard that is trying to invade Scadrial.Why? First because it would be the only logical explanation for a metal Harmony has never seen. Second, because Trellium is a starship component in star trek. Having it be the power source of allomancy-using starships in this franchise would be a nice shoutout.

• Partially Jossed. As mentioned below, Brandon has let slip that "ettmetal" is sazedium.

The Metal the Southerners use to power allomantic technology is Sodium

For several reasons. It explodes in water, and it makes sense that it's unknown: Sodium is very hard to isolate as a pure metal, and it's harder to keep it that way. Also, it makes a certain amount of sense that a notoriously reactive metal would be an allomantic fuel source.

• Jossed: Brandon let slip at an interview that it's Sazedium.

Harmony is responsible for Ferrings.

In the Mistborn books, Feruchemy was all-or-nothing: You were either a Feruchemist with access to all metals, or you weren't. Despite the Lord Ruler trying to breed Feruchemy out of the Terris people, "Ferrings" (Terris with one Feruchemical power) weren't a thing. Before Ascending, Sazed had seen the starts of Terrismen interbreeding with others, and knew that, if true Feruchemy survived, there was always the possibility of another Lord Ruler rising. So he altered Feruchemy to make it more common, but less powerful, creating Ferrings.

• It's actually a natural consequence of Feruchemy genes being diluted in the population through outbreeding.

The metalminds that anyone can use are created...

...Using the "Allomantic grenades" that siphon Allomantic powers and radiate them in all directions. Later in the book, Allik demonstrates that their proper use is to be slotted into a larger machine that then uses the power constructively. What we don't get to see is that the "primer cubes" try to mimic Feruchemical powers as well, but without metalminds they just fizzle out. The Excisers, therefore, are Magitek devices that mimic Feruchemists, but because they're inanimate, the metalminds they create can be used by anyone.

VenDell was replaced between the two conversations in Bands of Mourning

Because what's the point in a two hour break? Something happened between that time.

• Never mind. He went to fetch train tickets. Although it is possible...

The Set has a male Mistborn or full Feruchemist

All of the hostages were chosen because they're a) descended from the Lord Mistborn, and b) female. If the point was to just breed Allomancers, then they should have taken in male descendants as well. The crew thinks that they want to breed a Mistborn before they rediscover Hemalurgy, which might be valid after all. The donors could be willing, abducted, or the set is using artificial insemation. Possible donors include:

• Someone we've never met before.
• Kelsier, willing or not.
• Marsh, likely unwilling.
• Spook.

The Bands were made to aid someone in the Cognitive Realm

Through most of Secret History, Kelsier is a ghost in the Cognitive Realm, and he can't use Allomancy without a connection to the physical realm (a body). However, even he can carry and use the Cognitive versions of objects, until they're moved or destroyed in the Physical Realm. The best things to carry are abandoned objects. To restore his Allomancy, he created an artifact that grants anyone Allomancy, making sure they're not moved or destroyed in the Physical Realm, and carries the Cognitive version of the Bands (this might not work, but he tried). That's why he let the legend of the Bands spread while forbidding anyone from looking; the legend keeps the Bands from fading from the Cognitive Realm, and the ban on searching makes it unlikely for them to move it.

Trell is the Shard for Unity, the opposite of Autonomy

The Set's theme is names for groups of things (Suit, Array, etc.), and the thing at the end of Bands of Mourning uses we as a pronoun, and doesn't care about losing one body. Also, I think Tuple would be an amusing name, since it's esoteric.

The Lost Metal will have some elements from pulp novels

All of the books so far have taken things from pulp novels: Alloy of Law was a Western with bandits and a train battle, Shadows of Self was mostly a detective story, and Bands of Mourning had the crew explore an ancient temple. What other pulp elements would Lost Metal have?

• Robots.
• Alien invaders.
• Mafia. Not like the Set, but cigar-chomping gangsters.
• The occult. Someone uses their Allomancy/Feruchemy and disguises it as witchcraft using trickery. Or a Worldhopper making their magic look like witchcraft that looks like Metalborn powers on closer inspection.
• Ghosts, demons, vampires, etc. Might not be real, but it sure looks like it.

Guesses about Sliverism

At the time of this writing, the latest Mistborn books are Bands of Mourning and Secret History, and all we know about it is that they revere Ironeyes.

• It worships the Lord Ruler, and Ironeyes is subordinate to him as a prophet. Both are worshiped, but Ironeyes isn't quite a god, the same way the Survivor isn't quite one either.
• It was born from skaa worship of the Lord Ruler in addition to Steel Minstry doctrine. Final Empire says that skaa usually leave religion to the Obligators, but that changes after TLR's death. The same way that Kelsier's death founded the Church of the Survivor, TLR's death kicked off a resurgence of faith among the skaa. Well of Ascension and Hero of Ages show skaa who still believe in TLR, even though he was a tyrant. Some tell Marsh that they'll worship again if TLR would return. Without Obligators, the skaa formed their own religious sects, and they eventually folded together with the Steel Ministry to form Sliverism.
• They treat TLR as a god of prosperity and stability. Since TLR 'abandoning' them led to famine and chaos, TLR represent the opposite.
• Alternately, they worship Vin as TLR's heir.

Spook spiked himself

Given that he advocated for Hemalurgy on people already close to death, it would be hypocritical of him to not spike himself, especially since he lived for over a hundred years. According to the Hemalurgy table, Lerasium can steal all abilities, and Atium can steal any ability. We don't know where to find Lerasium, but Marsh at least has Atium. Even though Atium appears to only grant one power, since Hemalurgy grants powers depending on where the spike is placed on the recipient, it might be possible for the spike to contain all of Spook's powers, and the user changes powers by removing and replacing it on different parts of their body. Or, since some metals steal categories of power rather than a single power (i.e. steel steals physical allomantic powers), he used a normal metal. Whichever metal he used, the Lord Mistborn's spike will be a MacGuffin.

The legal system that favors the defense will come in handy for the heroes

In Shadows of Self, the heroes were hampered by the legal system and the need to follow the rules; the constables can't extract confessions through torture or intimidation, and MeLaan refuses to bear false witness even if it lets criminals get off. This might pay off for the heroes if they're ever on the wrong side of the law, (such as for the murder of Lady Kelsina).

Wayne will successfully steal Marsh's accent

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