Difference between revisions of "Jasnah Kholin"

|parents=[[Gavilar Kholin|Gavilar]], [[Navani Kholin|Navani]]

|siblings=[[Elhokar Kholin|Elhokar]]

|relatives=[[Dalinar Kholin|Dalinar]], [[Adolin Kholin|Adolin]], [[Renarin Kholin|Renarin]], [[Gavinor]], [[Kaves]]

|titles=Princess of [[Alethkar]] <small>(former)</small>, Queen of [[Alethkar]]

|groups={{tag|Knights Radiant}} <small>([[Order of Elsecallers|Elsecallers]])</small><br />{{tag|Veristitalians|link=Veristitalian}}s

|booksfirst appeared=[[The StormlightWay of ArchiveKings]]

'''Jasnah Kholin''' is the queen of [[Alethkar]] on [[Roshar]].{{book ref|sa3|122}} She is a [[Surgebinder]] and [[Elsecaller]], with access to the [[Surge|Surges]] of [[Transformation]] and [[Transportation]], sometimes called "Elsecalling."{{book ref|sa2|epilogue}} She is the sister of the late King [[Elhokar Kholin|Elhokar]], daughter of the late King [[Gavilar Kholin|Gavilar]] and [[Navani Kholin|Navani]], niece of Highprince [[Dalinar Kholin|Dalinar]], aunt of royal heir [[Gavinor]], and cousin to [[Adolin]] and [[Renarin]]. She is known widely as a brilliant scholar and for her denunciation of [[Vorinism]].{{book ref|sa1|3}} She is a member of the [[Veristitalian]]s, an order of historians dedicated to reconstructing unbiased and factual accounts of the past in order to better understand the present.{{book ref|sa1|28}} She iswas training [[Shallan Davar]] as her [[ward]], but has since finished prior to the [[Urithiru#Capture_of_Urithiru|capture of Urithiru]].{{book ref|sa1|8}}{{book ref|sa4|21}}

{{image|Jasnah by Nozomi.jpg|side=right|width=250px|Jasnah andwearing her [[IvoryShardplate]]}}

Jasnah is generally a stern and serious person, although she occasionally shows a wry sense of humor,{{book ref|sa1|29}} and allows familiarity among those she is close with.{{book ref|sa3|15}} She sometimes acts in a brusque manner, and can be exceptionally rude when someone gets on her bad side.{{book ref|sa1|33}} She is determined, confident, and often stubborn.{{book ref|sa1|8}} She has a brilliant mind and shows wisdom and care in her studies.{{book ref|sa1|3}} She is very passionate about scholarship and wants others to share in her passion as well.{{book ref|sa1|29}} She often encourages her ward, Shallan, to come up with answers on her own, rather than simply giving them to her.{{book ref|sa1|36}} She considers history to be the most important literary sub art. She is prejudiced against the visual arts, going so far as to call them frivolities, although having Shallan as her ward may have changed her opinions on the subject.{{book ref|sa1|5}} She can be extremely tough and ruthless, as she showed when she killed four footpads that attacked her and Shallan. She harbors a deep hatred towards men like them, possibly because of something that has been done to her in the past.{{book ref|sa1|36}}

Jasnah is an atheist.{{book ref|sa1|29}} This has caused her nota an insignificantsignificant amount of problems and led to her being ostracized a bit, but she has never compromised in her beliefs for the sake of appearances.{{book ref|sa1|28}} While she is confident in her lack of faith in the [[devotary|devotaries]], like the true scholar that she is, she also always keeps an open mind to the possibility of being wrong. She is content to keep her beliefs to herself, and doesn't particularly care about converting anyone else.{{book ref|sa1|29}}

Jasnah is asexual but is willing to be intimate with a person she cares for.{{book ref|sa4|17}}{{wob ref|14288}} She also prefers that her sexuality not be a matter of discussion.{{wob ref|12642}}

Jasnah has a [[Nahel bond]] with the [[inkspren]] [[Ivory]] which gives her the ability to Surgebind.{{book ref|sa2|3}} She has access to the Surges of [[Transformation]] and [[Transportation]].{{book ref|sa1|72}} As with all Surgebinders, she has superhuman speed, strength and healing when she holds Stormlight. She has demonstrated her ability to Soulcast multiple times, as well as the power to enter and leave Shadesmar (the [[Cognitive Realm]]). She is in the process of becoming a [[Knights Radiant|Knight Radiant]] of the [[Order of Elsecallers]].

She has also shown the ability to Soulcast multiple targets from a distance. In this method of Soulcasting, bolts of Stormlight can be seen traveling towards the intended target. When Jasnah used this ability to transform two men into smoke, it caused the [[Polestone#Smokestone|smokestone]] she used to shatter, indicating that this method may use more Stormlight than regular Soulcasting.{{book ref|sa1|36}} This ability may be a specialized version of Soulcasting or a distinct ability resulting from manipulating a combination of the Surges of transformationTransformation and transportationTransportation.

As a Knight Radiant who has access to two Surges she also has a [[resonance]].{{wob ref|1296}} When she met [[Hoid]] after returning from the [[Cognitive Realm]], she immediately starts walking towards the nearest town, which prompts Hoid to think she has "a good sense of direction."{{book ref|sa2|epilogue}} Some suspect this indicates that the Elsecaller resonance is some sort of internal GPS that, at least, allows them to determine their exact location and the direction to the nearest settlement. Her sense of direction could also be due to seeing the lights of human souls in the Cognitive Realm. Brandon has not clearly confirmed or denied this.{{wob ref|6740}}

{{image|JasnahTheir Farewell by horizonproblemsMarie Seeberger.jpg|Jasnah and [[Dalinar]] at [[Gavilar]]'s funeral|side=left|height=300px}}

==== ParshendiSinger Betrayal ====

Jasnah hesitated in returning to the party after she heard the music in the dining hall stop abruptly. She ran into [[Nale]] and possibly [[Kalak]], two "ambassadors from the west" who had been invited by the king.{{book ref|sa2|99prologue}}{{book ref|text=Of the other male Heralds, [[Jezrien]] was already present as the beggar Ahu, [[Talenel]] was still trapped on [[Braize]], and [[Ishar]] is the God-Priest Tezim.sa4|77}} Jasnah heard sudden screams and ran toward them, fearing for her family's safety. The sounds led to her father's chambers, and the way was littered with corpses with burned eyes and the walls marked by [[Shardblade]] cuts. She eventually reached a balcony and saw her father in his [[Shardplate]], called to him and made him hesitate. The balcony broke beneath [[Gavilar]], and Jasnah saw the servant she'd seen before fall down with her father. The Shin man somehow changed direction in the air, and fell onto the wall, completely ignoring gravity. While crying to herself, Jasnah was approached by three Parshendi[[singers]], [[Klade]], [[Gangnah]] and [[Varnali]]. They took responsibility for the assassination and told Jasnah they were sorry for her loss but explained that Gavilar had to be stopped from doing something dangerous. Gavilar, as a member of the [[Sons of Honor|Son of Honor]], was trying to bring back the Parshendi gods[[Fused]] in the hopes that the [[Knights Radiant]] would return, reinstating the dominance of the Vorin church.{{book ref|sa3|prologue}}{{book ref|sa2|88}} Sadeas stumbled in, saw what happened, and ran toward Gavilar's corpse, where they found [[Szeth|Szeth's]]'s note to [[Dalinar]] written in Gavilar's blood, telling him to find the most important [[Immortal Words|words]] a man could say.{{book ref|sa2|prologue}} Jasnah later discovered that this was a direct quote from [[The Way of Kings (in-world)|''The Way of Kings'']] by [[Nohadon]].{{book ref|sa1|15}}

Hours later, they discovered that the admission and the surrender of those three of the [[Council of Five]] covered the escape of the rest of the Parshendisingers. Dalinar sent several failed expeditions after the escapees. After refusing to divulge information, the three Parshendisingers were hanged. Jasnah interrogated Liss and the King's guards about the Assassin in White to no avail, and for the next half-decade would turn to [[The Way of Kings/Epigraphs#Jasnah's Notes|ancient books]] for her answers.{{book ref|sa2|prologue}}

{{image|Of Power and Perception by Marie Seeberger.jpg|side=right|width=350px|Talking with [[Shallan]] aboard the ''[[Wind's Pleasure]]''}}

After her travel through the Cognitive Realm, Jasnah returnedheaded to [[Urithiru]] to resume her fight against the [[Voidbringers]]. She observed many of Dalinar's visions, searching for hints about locations and time periods in which they took place to try to glean more information about pre-[[Aharietiam]] Roshar and the ancient Knights Radiant.{{book ref|sa3|33}} She was unable to identify distinguishing landmarks, either because the landscape had changed over time or because they were in uncharted territory, but she did identify [[Jezrien|Jezerezeh, king of the Heralds]], in the vision of Aharietiam.{{book ref|ob|42}}

Jasnah wrote a ketek for Shallan on her wedding day to celebrate the occasion.{{book ref|sa3|epigraphendnote}}

===== The Expedition of the Wandersail =====

Jasnah had direct involvement in monitoring the [[Expedition to Akinah|expedition]] of the ''[[Wandersail (1174 ship)|Wandersail]]'' to [[Akinah]]. Ardent [[Rushu]] was in communication with Jasnah via [[spanreed]] to report sightings of unusual spren and reported a cluster of [[luckspren]] following the ''Wandersail'' after [[Cord]] sighted them.{{book ref|sa3.5|7}} After a [[santhid]] corpse was found by the crew of the ''Wandersail'', and was subsequently exposed as a fake, Jasnah was contacted by [[Vstim]] on behalf of [[Rysn Ftori|Rysn]] to ask about the legends of the [[Aimian]]s. Jasnah recalled two theories on the nature of the santhid that disintegrated into a pile of cremlings; the first being reports of Aimians being able to take off their arms and legs and reattach them; the second being an old story about creatures who were living heaps of cremlings. In the stories these creatures would hide and grow in the attics of buildings before devouring the occupants below. Jasnah originally overlooked these stories but due to the current events on Roshar at the time, cautioned Rysn against these types of creatures.{{book ref|sa3.5|9}} When Rysn postulated that the santhid could have been the work of a [[Fused]] [[Surgebinding#Illumination|Lightweaver]], Jasnah chided herself for her own lapse in judgement, citing the newness of Lightweaving magic as the reason for overlooking it as a possibility. Jasnah drew the conclusion that if an enemy Lightweaver were attempting to stop the expedition, then the [[Voidbringer]]s would be taking considerable lengths to prevent them from reaching Akinah, and the secrets there must be more important than first believed.{{book ref|sa3.5|9}}

Jasnah was a main character in [[The Way of Kings Prime]], Brandon's 2002 draft of [[The Way of Kings]],{{wob ref|8069}} and her arc was the most complete out of all the threads.{{wob ref|4108}} Her plot line centered around her struggle against societal norms and her fight against outside pressures to marry.{{wob ref|7804}} In the 2010 version of The Way of Kings, this was relegated to her backstory so that Shallan could take center stage.{{wob ref|4978}}{{wob ref|7124}} Jasnah's personality was left mostly unchanged between the two versions, and her name was one among a couple that was also --kept, in fact, Jasnah's name, along with Dalinar's, was central to Brandon's creation of the Alethi tongue.{{wob ref|1991}} She is the flashback character for Stormlight Archive Ten.{{wob ref|11620}}As such, she will become even more prominent as the series continues.{{wob ref|1673}}

* In [[The Way of Kings Prime|''The Way of Kings'' Prime]], Jasnah was a viewpoint character with as many chapters as the other characters. [[Brandon Sanderson]] decided too many viewpoints was too distracting and cut Jasnah's parts in the final version.{{wob ref|10204}}

* Brandon has released an uncannonicaluncanonical scene directly following Jasnah transferring to Shadesmar after she is stabbed aboard the ''Winds Pleasure'', which can be read on <span class="plainlinks">[https://tor.com/2014/08/06/stormlight-archive-scene-after-words-of-radiance/ on Tor's website]</span>.

* Jasnah is [[Wikipedia: asexuality|asexual]] and [[Wikipedia: heteroromantic| heteroromantic]], but has a neutral opinion of physical intimacy.{{wob ref|14288}}