Jasnah Kholin (The Stormlight Archive)

"When we are young, we want simple answers. There is no greater indication of youth, perhaps, than the desire for everything to be as it should . As it has ever been. The older we grow, the more we question. We begin to ask why. And yet, we still want the answers to be simple. We assume that the people around us&mdash;adults, leaders&mdash;will have those answers. Whatever they give often satisfies us. ... Indeed, it seems to me that aging, wisdom, and wondering are synonymous. The older we grow, the more likely we are to reject the simple answers. Unless someone gets in our way and demands they be accepted regardless."

- Jasnah to Shallan

"What is a woman's place in this modern world? I rebel against this question, though so many of my peers ask it. The inherent bias in the inquiry seems invisible to so many of them. They consider themselves progressive because they are willing to challenge many of the assumptions of the past.

They ignore the greater assumption--that a 'place' for women must be defined and set forth to begin with. Half of the population must somehow be reduced to the role arrived at by a single conversation. No matter how broad that role is, it will be--by-nature--a reduction from the infinite variety that is womanhood.

I say that there is no role for women--there is, instead, a role for each woman, and she must make it for herself. For some, it will be the role of scholar; for others, it will be the role of wife. For others, it will be both. For yet others, it will be neither.

Do not mistake me in assuming I value one woman's role above another. My point is not to stratify our society--we have done that far too well already--my point is to diversify our discourse.

A woman's strength should not be in her role, whatever she chooses it to be, but in the power to choose that role. It is amazing to me that I even have to make this point, as I see it as the very foundation of our conversation."

- Jasnah

"It strikes me that religion—in its essence—seeks to take natural events and ascribe supernatural causes to them. I, however, seek to take supernatural events and find the natural meanings behind them. Perhaps that is the final dividing line between science and religion. Opposite sides of a card."

- Jasnah on why she researches Voidbringers

Summary
Jasnah Kholin is a Knights Radiant of the Order of Elsecallers, a leading scholar in her era, and eventually, the Queen of Alethkar.

Jasnah Kholin was born in 1139 to Gavilar and Navani Kholin.

Over her life, she would become famous not only as a scholar, but also become infamous for her denunciation of the Vorin Church and the history it teaches, making her be viewed as a heretic by much of the very religious Alethi society. Though despite this she remained steadfast in her viewpoints, even when derided by her own father, who wanted her to turn towards the church and accept a betrothal to Meridias Amaram, both of which she rejected.

In 1166, she transcribed the meeting between Gavilar Kholin and the Parshendi, and developed an interest in studying the Parshendi and the Shattered Plains.

In 1167, Jasnah attended the feast held in the Kholinar Palace after the signing of the Parshendi treaty. But she came with the intention of assassinating Aesudan, Elhokar's wife, but on her way to the meeting with Liss, the assassin, she noticed strange happenings. This is where she first discovered that her shadow began to stretch the wrong way, towards the light, and when she would first see Ivory. Seeing him caused her to flee in terror and enter into Shadesmar for the first time. She managed to return to the Physical Realm, and decided to call off the assassination.

She would shortly after find the aftermath of the assassination of Gavilar, and the Shin assassin running away. This death and betrayal led to her developing a hatred for the Parshendi, and led to her study of ancient books in order to find the myriad connections between the Voidbringers and the Parshendi, and her developing a theory that they were on in the same. Many people came to her during this period asking for wardship, and she turned down the vast majourity of requests.

In the year 1172 she got a letter of request for wardship by Shallan Davar, and asked her to meet in Drumadari. She spent the next six months traveling from town to town, leaving notes for Shallan when she left so the young woman could follow her. She eventually reached Kharbranth in 1173. Where they met together and she accepted her as a ward. She would teach her over the next two months. And would also face an assassination attempt from Kabsal, a member of the Ghostbloods disguising himself as being an Ardent in order to get close enough to her to kill her. Though his attempts would fail and she survived.

Late 1173 (1173.9.6.2), both her and Shallan began to ride the Wind's Pleasure down to the Shattered Plains. Though they were attacked by another group of Ghostbloods, and she was stabbed by a sword, but quickly escaped to Shadesmar. Yet was for a long period believed dead until she found a way to escape Shadesmar around two months later (1174.1.1.4).

During the Battle of Thaylen Field, 1174.2.7.5, she fought against various Voidbringers, but most notably almost slew her cousin, Renarin Kholin as she discovered he was bound to a Corrupted Mistspren, however she couldn't bring herself to do it. This had a majour effect due to how it proved that the Visions of the future Renarin had were not absolute, making him a useful asset in using his visions in order to help prevent future tragedies.

After the Battle of Thaylen Field and the announcement that Elhokar was killed during his expedition to the conquered Kholinar, she was crowned the Queen of Alethkar due to the direct heir, Gavinor, being too young to rule.

Jasnah went with Dalinar on the military expedition into Emul, where she wanted to prove herself to be a good military leader and tactician. She even fought in the front lines during the large infantry confrontation at Drunmu Basin.

Personality
Jasnah is generally a stern and serious person, although she occasionally shows a wry sense of humor, and allows familiarity among those she is close with. She is determined, confident, and can often be quite stubborn.

She is prejudiced against the visual arts, going so far as to call them frivolities. And she is very passionate in her studies and enjoys sharing in it. She is passionate to the extent that she considers history to be the most important literary sub-art.

Due to the assassination of her father, she holds a hatred for the Parshendi, who betrayed him. This led to her study into trying to find connections between the Parshendi and the Voidbringers.

She is an adamant atheist, rejecting the validity of any faith. Though she does believe that all faiths hold a degree of truth and basis, which she looks into and tries to discover beyond what she sees as lies and twisted information. Although she is kind enough to respect those that do hold such beliefs, even if she doesn't agree with them. She will not actively try to convert anyone to her atheistic viewpoint, and is open to the idea of being wrong.

She is asexual heteroromantic, though is not entirely opposed to having sex, and will be willing to be intimate with one she loves if they so desire it.

Renarin
She cares deeply for Renarin, to the extent that, even despite seeing that he was bonded to a Corrupted Spren, she couldn't bring herself to kill him, even though she believed it to be necessary. They both feel a bond to each other due to both spending much of their life as outcasts in the Alethi court, Jasnah due to her atheism, and Renarin due to his Autism and Epilepsy; this led to them feeling especially close to one another.

Shallan
Shallan is her ward, and she can be quite judgmental and forceful towards her, wishing for her to live up to her expectations. This at points can lead to their relationship being quite strained through their frustrations with each other. Though the two ultimately remain on good terms.

Hoid
Sometime after Jasnah’s return from Shadesmar, she and Hoid grow close. Jasnah cares more for mental stimulation than the physical, which makes interacting with Hoid invigorating to her, for she finds him mysterious and is deeply interested in him

The two are prone to witty banter in their conversations.

Powers and Stats
Name: Jasnah Kholin

Age: 36 (40 Earth Years)

Gender: Female

Classification: Elsecaller, Knights Radiant, Alethi, Veristitalian, Scholar, Shardbearer, Queen of Alethkar

Powers and Abilities: Regeneration, Transmutation and Limited Telepathy via Transformation, Limited Teleportation via Transportation, Limited Durability Negation and Soul Manipulation via Shardblade, Superhuman Physical Characteristics via Stormlight, Limited Healing via Transformation

Attack Potency: Average normally (She is a normal human, physically speaking. And is not exceptional in any way in terms of her physical prowess), Much Higher with Stormlight (When pulling upon Stormlight she is capable of greatly enhancing her physical strength to superhuman levels)

Durability: Average normally, Much Higher with Stormlight (A Surgebinder fully enhanced by Stormlight is capable of withstanding much heavier blows than any normal human. Even capable of surviving a fall at terminal velocity.)

Intelligence: Genius, Jasnah is a very intelligent individual, being a scholar known around the world for her studies and findings. Yet she knows to question what she thinks she knows, often checking the veracity of her sources, and collecting information from countless different sources, in order to create a factual and unbiased account of the past events that she feels are misrepresented. From her sources she was able to correctly deduce that the Parshendi were in fact the Voidbringers refered to in ancient Vorin texts, something that only the Ghostbloods and the Diagram were aware of. She is an effective military strategist, depicting her ability to lead the military during her time at Emul. She also played a majour role in helping to bring together the Coalition of Monarchs. She is multilingual, able to speak in Alethi, Kharbaranthian, Azish, and likely many others.

Weaknesses: Due to her soul being filled with Stormlight, she is extremely weak to Anti-Stormlight, with it easily being capable of completely destroying her soul when it interacts with the substance, with a sufficient amount it can go beyond regenerative capacity and kill her permanently. Along with this, the Anti-Tone of Honor would cause her extreme pain and discomfort, as it did to Navani.

Shardblade
She has a Shardblade that she can summon, manifesting Ivory as a Shardblade.

They do not act as ordinary blades in that they do not cut living flesh, but rather effervesce and pass through it, leaving the flesh unharmed and instead cutting the Spiritweb itself. If the Blade cuts the core of a person's limb, the person feels a flash of incredible pain and then the limb turns gray and becomes limp and numb. If an internal organ is pierced by a Shardblade, it may be killed or cease to function. If the spine or head is cut, the eyes of the person blacken and burn out with a dark smoke rising from them.

When cutting through something not classified as alive, they still cut far better than any other sword, able to cut through any non-Invested material with relative ease. A cut from a Honorblade, or even a Shardblade for that matter, leave distinctive perfectly clean cuts.

As a Living Blade, she is capable of altering the shape and size of the blade to her will, even changing it to entirely different weapons.

Shardplate
Shardplate is a form of armour powered by Stormlight, using it greatly increases her strength, allowing her to do things impossible for an ordinary human. Along with this, it is incredibly durable, able to take heavy blows without breaking.

Upon having a portion of it shatter, it can be regenerated with the addition of more Stormlight. If one runs out of Stormlight, or the breastplate shatters, the added strength would fade and she would be left immobile from the weight of the armour.

Due to being very heavily Invested, this cannot be effected by Lashings.

Surgebinding
"As to the other orders that were inferior in this visiting of the far realm of spren, the Elsecallers were prodigiously benevolent, allowing others as auxiliary to their visits and interactions; though they did never relinquish their place as prime liaisons with the great ones of the spren; and the Lightweavers and Willshapers both also had an affinity to the same, though neither were true masters of that realm."

- Words of Radiance, chapter 6, page 2

Surge of Transformation
Using the Surge of Transformation she is able to turn one material into another. This is done by reaching into Shadesmar and convincing an object to change, once the convincing is done, she applies Stormlight to it and causing a change in the Spiritual and Physical aspects of the object, bringing about a transmutation into another material. However, not every object is inclined to change, depending on how the object is seen by the sentient species and how it sees itself, so the Surgebinder may need to negotiate with it.

This is limited by knowledge and intent, therefore, while they would be capable of Transmuting an object into something like uranium, due to modern Rosharans lacking any knowledge of such materials, she would not be capable of doing so. However, this is not the only limitation, as she cannot transmute anything into one of the Ten Polestones, that is to say Sapphire, Smokestone, Ruby, Diamond, Emerald, Garnet, Zircon, Amethyst, Topaz, or Heliodor; nor can she transmute Aluminium into anything due to the Investiture Inert properties of the metal.

She is skilled enough in Soulcasting that she can easily Soulcast humans into various materials, killing them; and has also shown the ability to Soulcast multiple targets from a distance. When Jasnah used this ability to transform two men into smoke, it caused the smokestone she used to shatter, indicating that this method may use more Stormlight than regular Soulcasting.

Jasnah can use Soulcasting in various ways with great precision, ranging from burning letters into a page, to transforming boulders into smoke , and even purifying Shallan's blood from a poison called backbreaker powder

It is easiest to transform something into one of the Ten Essences, however, this does not mean one cannot turn it into something outside of the Ten Essences.


 * Translucent Gas, Air
 * Opaque Gas, Smoke, Fog
 * Fire
 * Quartz, Glass, Crystal
 * Wood, Plants, Moss
 * Blood, All Non-Oil Liquid
 * All Kinds of Oil
 * Metal
 * Rock and Stone
 * Meat, Flesh

While she could Soulcast something into Aluminium, she would be unable to Soulcast Aluminium itself into anything else due to its Investiture Inert properties.

Due to the underlying mechanics of the Cosmere, it is more difficult to Soulcast Invested objects, as Investiture resists the effects of Invested Arts.

While never seen doing it, she should be capable of temporarily manifesting the physical form of an object in the Cognitive Realm by using the Bead relating to it. As shown by Shallan. However, this may be limited to Lightweavers, and not extend to Elsecallers. However, this has not been proven one way or the other.

Surge of Transportation
Through the use of the Surge of Transportation she is capable of teleporting herself directly into Shadesmar, the transfer of one's physical body into and out of the Cognitive Realm. This essentially works through the creation of a miniature Perpendicularity, a place where all Three Realms are pulled together, allowing for transfer between them.

She is capable of spreading this Perpendicularity into a larger area to carry multiple people into it.

This is most easily done in order to enter the Cognitive Realm, and it is far more difficult to leave it.

Through the use of Transportation, Jasnah can identify Fused based on sight through seeing their Cognitive Manifestation, which appears differently depending on if they are Fused or not.

Scholarship
She is one of the most intelligent and renowned scholars of her era, known across the world for her studies. She would have been given the rank of a master scholar if not for her denunciation of the Vorin Church making her despised by most.

She is particularly known for her research into and theories concerning the Voidbringers and Urithiru, her central theory dealing with the connections between the Parshendi and the Voidbringers of legend. Which, while mainly motivated by revenge, did lead to her finding a large amount of evidence supporting her theory, which, in the end, turned out to be correct. As the Singers were the Voidbringers throughout most of the Desolations.

She has an in depth knowledge of Rosharan history, gathered over a lifetime of study into finding the truth of the past based on countless different sources.

Multilingualism
She is fluent in various languages, able to easily speak in and read in various tongues. Such as Alethi, and Azish.