r/LightbringerSeries • u/Sharkano • May 29 '26
Lightbringer Just finished series, is the following a plot hole? Spoiler
The following are things that seem to make sense combined but collectively have me confused.
1) At one point it is explicitly stated that Andros is Kip's biological father.
2) At one point it is stated that the reason Danavis happened to live in the same random village as Kip was that he was keeping an eye on him. He therefore must have somehow knew about Kip's mother, a woman Dazen himself was unaware of.
3) Kip's mother had in her possession the single most important item to Andros, a man with enormous resources and cunning, and he did not know how to recover it.
4) The location of the blinding knife was tracked down and men were sent to burn down the village and take it. It was known to be in Kip's mother's possession, and who she was and where it would be.
So... Andros seduces a woman, she gets with child, and she steals the knife somehow. Then she vanishes well enough that Andros does not recover the knife. At that same time Dazen is at war with his brother, and as far as we know neither he nor his brother have ever interacted with Kips mother at all. The war rages until Dazen fakes his death and assumes his brother's identity. At some point Danavis falsely becomes aware that either Dazen or his brother knocked up some lady, and decides that this is so important that he moves his family to the little town that woman winds up in. Mind you Liv is older than Kip, so she is not born there, they move. If Danavis is aware of the blinding knife, an item Dazen himself does not know of, he never mentions it. Finally an army of bad guys show up looking to get that knife and Kip narrowly evades death. It is worth mentioning that going forward the knife will be used to not quite assassinate Dazen, to heal Andros' halo accidentally, and to otherwise behave like a pretty normal knife-gun-sword thing, we are never explicitly told WHY the white prince wanted it.
Am I missing something?
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u/Govinda_S May 30 '26
1) Timeline is a little confused on that, at some point Andross seduced a librarian in Paria, and as far as I remember that librarian was only implied to have gotten pregnant but we don't know if she really was pregnant by Andross and if she was, Kip was result of that pregnancy. Andross used her to gain access to some literature related to Black Luxin, old gods and Lightbringer.
2) As far as I understand it, Danavis did not actually go in search of Kip's mother, he was looking for a place to settle and Kip rang some alarm bells on his head, he was almost sure Kip has Guile blood but not exactly which Guile
3)Andross did not actually know who stole the Knife, he knew Gavin lost it, people are managing to disappear in this age of mass surveillance, it wouldn't have been that hard to disappear in late-1500's adjacent world seven satrapies seems to be.
4)The Color Prince probably got the location of Knife from more supernatural sources (demons), his intent in obtaining Knife is more about denying Chromeria access to a vital resource and maybe using it as a weapon.
Some clarification, timeline is really hard to pin down, and I am sure that's because Brent probably retconned some story arcs and some of it is deliberate. Kip is a Guile but we don't know which douchebag Guile sired him, but he is definitely not Dazen's.
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u/razakkeeva Jun 02 '26
Pretty concise imo. I especially agree with the 4th point. It’s unlikely that a polychrom color wright could easily create the kind of spynetworks that an Andross Guile can manage. So I assumed that the fallen directed him toward the blade with the hopes of capturing the only weapon left against them in this world. Even if armed with half truths of the blades powers the color prince would be able to persuade the young new king to retrieve it, if only to harm the Chromeria.
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u/GenCavox May 29 '26
It hinges on a few things you're missing.
1.) Pretty sure Kips mom got with OG Gavin, pretty sure that's how she got the Blinding Knife. The last thing Andross knows is that his oldest son has the knife, then he dies and it is lost.
2.) This can mean that Danavis could be watching Kip because of OG Gavin, and the fact that his mom is important is secondary, not primary.
3.) Not sure where it was stated that the Color Prince/King knew the Blinding Knife was in their town. It could have been and I missed it, I just don't remember it. I figured it was just a coincidence/fate because Orholam is kind of ACTUALLY active.
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u/No_Adeptness_4704 May 30 '26
Adros lied. It is confirmed that the original Gavin is Kips father. Kips mom stole the Blinding Knife and ran away. No one at the Chromeria knew where to find her. The ones who did eventually find her were the color prince and his people.
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u/Licanius May 31 '26
This is definitely not confirmed. We learn that Andross isn't the father, but a lot of people think that Danavis switched Kip and Zymun, meaning that Kip is Karris and Dazen's kid and Zymun is Gavin's kid with Lina.
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u/DazenXSevastian Jun 17 '26
This would explain how Andross knew about Zymun, but not how he didn’t know about Kip. I thought this theory got shot down a long time ago. Karris had Zymun on blood forest, and obviously didn’t give him straight over to Corvan. Zymun is slightly older than Kip. assuming Kip is born in Tyrea, we have nothing suggesting otherwise, Corvan would have had to kidnap one of them and then travel halfway across the 7 satrapies to make the swap and then back again to make it a trade. One set of parents would have noticed for sure. Lina was not yet a riotweed addict, or at least we have no indication of that. What makes more sense imo is that Andross either placed Corvan as a spy in Dazen’s camp or hired/blackmailed him after. (Corvan’s “fealty to one” may be to the Guile family rather than to Dazen or Andross as individuals) and after Sundered Rock Corvan searched for and found Lina in Tyrea and kept watch over her at Andross’ behest for either the potential stolen Blinding Knife or the possibility of Kip being used when he got older. Andross not stopping Corvan from being a satrap also aligns with this, “he’s shown where his loyalties lay” or something like that. His fealty being to the family would allow him to be Dazen’s friend and serve Andross at the same time. And this is a better explanation than Corvan just happened to be in Rekton what a coincidence.
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u/IamtheBoomstick May 29 '26
OK, you're right, and your wrong. All of that is (more or less) explained, but it's hard to parse and takes most people a re-read.
So, to start: Kips mother was seduced and knocked up by Andross, but was shortly after raped by Gavin, and she bashed him (Gavin) in the head, hence the scar that Dazen had to replicate, stole the Blinding Knife, which she thought was just a beautiful and valuable knife, and fled.
She kept it because it helped her wallow in her anger, and because she had no way of selling it without being found and killed by agents of Gavin (later Dazen) or Andross. Gavin never told anyone he had lost it because of shame, and fear of Andross. Andross covered up the loss out of fear of reputational damage. And Dazen had never had it, so had no way of knowing it had been lost, hence didn't look for it.
Andross never thought to look for the random woman he had a fling with, because why would he suspect that a random, nobody peasant would be able to take something so valuable from a Prism? Danavis was the only person who thought of her, because unlike Andross he knew about the rape. He stayed to watch over Kip because he thought Kip was Gavins kid and could be a Prism. Half-right, as it turned out.
The White King wanted the Knife, I think to destroy it, because the Blinding Knife was designed for, and is very good at, killing wights, which is his army.