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he Return of the Nym

by ReDragon: 2007-10-09 | Not yet rated

Previous Categories: Miscellaneous Theories

1) Nym - Giant plant-like beings numerous during the Age of Legends and used to facilitate growing crops.

2) Someshta dies, and then 'transfers' his life essence into an acorn as follows

Title : The Eye Of The World
Chapter : Meeting at the Eye

With a groan like a limb breaking under too great a weight, the Green Man crashed to the ground. Half his head was charred black. Tendrils of smoke still rose from him, like gray creepers. Burned leaves fell from his arm as he painful stretched out his blackened arm to gently cup an acorn.

The earth rumbled as an oak seedling pushed up between his fingers. The Green Man's head fell, but the seedling reached for the sun, straining. Roots shot out and thickened, delved beneath the ground and rose again, thickened more as they sank. The trunk broadened aand stretched upwards, bark turning gray and fissured and ancient. Limbs spread and grew heavy, as big as arms, as big as men, and lifted to caress the sky, thick with green leaves, dense with acorns. The massive web of roots turned the earth like plows as it spread; the already huge trunk shivered, grew wider, round as a house. Stillness came. And an oak that could have stood five hundred years covered the spot where the Green Man had been, marking the tomb of a legend.

3) I believe that the history of the Aiel as seen in the glass column's at Rhuidean is a key to returning the song to the Aiel

Title : The Shadow Rising
Chapter : The Dedicated
Jonai

Pg 433 "Each field would have its Nym, now."

Pg 434 "The Ogier began it, as was fitting, standing to sing, great bass rumbles like the earth singing. The Aiel rose, men's voices lifting in their own song, even the deepest at a higher pitch than the Ogier's. Yet the songs braided together, and Someshta took those threads and wove them into his dance, gliding across the field in swooping strides, arms wide, butterflies swirling about him, landing on his spread fingertips."

4) The Ogier treesingers have obviously retained their half of the song, and they are the other part of the key to the Nym's return.

Title : The Eye Of The World
Chapter : Remembrance of Dreams
Loial

"Actually, the trees won't listen to very many anymore, and so not many Ogier learn the songs. I have a scrap of that Talent, so Elder Arent insisted I learn."

5) Someshta was the last of the Nym in the 3rd Age

Title : The Shadow rising
Chapter : The dedicated
Solinda Sedai

"Then we will do what we must. The sword must wait. Someshta, we have a task for the last of the Nym."

6) Loial calls Shomshta "Treebrother" as shomshta calls Loial "little brother"

7) After Someshta's death at Aginor's hands and "transfering" his essence into the oak tree, before leaving the Green Man's garden, Loial sings to Someshta's tree, to preserve him / it from the advances of the blight.

Title : The Eye Of The World
Chapter : The Wheel Turns
Loial

"I've never sung so hard before. I could not have done it if something of Treebrother was not still there. My treesongs do not have his power."

8) The best growths came from Aiel, Ogier and Nym working together.

Title : The Shadow Rising
Chapter : The dedicated

"Someshta wove into the soil and around the seeds. Seeds no longer though. Zemais sprouts covered the field, taller wherever the Nym's foot had trod. No blight would touch those plants, nor any insect; seed sung, they would eventually grow twice as high as a man and fill the town's grainbarns."

9) Avendesora "the Tree of Life that was burned in Aginor's and Rand's little tussle in Rhuidean.

Title : Fires of Heaven
Chapter : Rhuidean
The burned tree mocked him. Avendesora, the legendary tree of life; the stories never said where it was, and it had been a surprise to find it here. Moiraine said it still lived, that it would put out shoots again, but so far he saw only blackened bark and bare branches.

So my conclusion is that the Nym will be recreated / brought forth again by the Ogier and Aiel. Maybe from the Avendesora tree in Rhuidean, but more likely from the Oak tree that Someshta created, and Loial preserved.

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Comments

1

Tamyrlin: 2010-10-24

I had forgotten all about the Nym before reading this idea. Considering the Blight and the Last Battle, I wonder if we'll see the return of this area of influence in the midst of the battle. With the Pattern breaking down, I wonder if the tree that sprung forth has been corrupted.

I think the most interesting part of this reminder has to do with what we read in Chapter One of Towers of Midnight. I won't spoil that for those that haven't had the chance.

I'm interested in you developing this idea more, but I owed you as you submitted this a long time ago and I always left it here because I wasn't sure if I wanted to post it in it's current format. :)

2

wotfreak222: 2010-10-24

I like this theory, but I don't think we will see the Nym again. One of the central tenets of the Wheel Of Time is that all things die in their appointed time, only to be reborn on the next turning of the Wheel. In this case, the Nym essentially died out during the Age of Legends, save for one (Someshta). The Nym were wiped out as a race during the Third Age - they will not be reborn until another turning of the Wheel. Nice theory, though....

3

RandoftheHandless: 2010-10-24

I agree, I think the Nym are gone. Ogier and Aiel will sing at the last battle, without the Nym.

Asmodean and Rand fought in Rhuidean, not Aginor and Rand.

4

RandoftheHandless: 2010-10-24

I agree with Tam, and WOT. The Nym are gone, for good. If there is any singing to be done at the LB (and I think there is) it will be the Aiel(probably Shaido) and Ogier.

Also, Aginor never fought Rand in Rhuidean, it was Asmodean. But he's a forsaken with an "A" name, so it's an understandable mistake.

5

Dragons Shadow: 2010-10-24

I was always under the impression the the Nym were created creatures. The spirit of nature embodied through use of the One Power. Reflections of the natural world.

6

Homeschool: 2010-10-24

@WOTFREAK222 - Just because they died off at the end of the Age of Legends (the Second Age?) doesn't mean they weren't born in the beginning of the Fourth Age.

I am curious to see if the Nym return. Seems like they could be a key to drawing out the song of the Aiel. But what I'd like to know is HOW. What originates them?

7

greebo: 2010-10-25

Actually, I was thinking just last night that it would make sense (at least to me) that a nym would play some role in the events to come. I happen to agree with the basics of this theory, and would like to see it happen.

8

FelixPax: 2010-10-25

Do I think the Nym returning ultimately is a good possibility? Yes.

I find this 'theory' about the Nym returning highly interesting, considering the use of the phrase "little brother" by the Nym Someshta to Loial.

"There is no honoring, little brother. We will sing Treesongs together, and remember the Great Trees, and the stedding, and hold the Longing at bay."

The Eye of the World, Chapter 49 'The Dark One Stirs' - Rand point of view

It's as if, "little brother" was a title of some sorts between Nym to the Ogier. Where this Nym returning theory gets interesting to me, is Rand al'Thor has a similar phrase "pop" into his mind from somewhere else--his memories.

"And don’t mention wagons again, little sister. I usually find out what you mean to do long after it is done."

The Aes Sedai frowned at him, and no wonder. She was surely not used to being addressed so, not by any man, even the Dragon Reborn. He had no idea himself where "little sister" had come from; sometimes of late words seemed to pop into his head. A touch of madness, perhaps. Some nights he lay awake till the small hours, worrying about that. Inside the Void, it seemed someone else’s worry.

The Fires of Heaven, Chapter 2 'Rhuidean' - Rand al'Thor point of view

Was Rand al'Thor soul once an Nym, an Ogier in another prior life? Or was al'Thor only a Human Singer in past lives? It's know that the Nym were constructs, so was Rand's soul once used as construct? Both the Ogier and the Nym did sing to aid plant life during the 2nd Age. Or are the phrases of 'Little Brother', 'Little Sister' referring to some other relationship ties?

Curiously, outside of Rand al'Thor only Moghedien has used the phrase 'Little Sister' as a type of title. Moghedien was also the one to, I think give Nynaeve an idea how revive a person's life and to bring souls from the 3rd Constant to the True World.

"Do you think that you are my equal, little sister?" Moghedien grimaced in disgust. "Did you stand in the Pit of Doom to dedicate your soul to the Great Lord? Did you taste the sweetness of victory at Paaran Disen, or the bitter ashes at the Asar Don? You are a barely trained puppy, not the pack-mistress, and you will go where I point until I see fit to give you a better place. These others thought themselves more than they are, too. Do you wish to try your strength against me?"

Chapter 18 'A Hound of Darkness' - Liandrin point of view

Moghedien's an unusual Forsaken in the sense, she knows have to bring a soul from one World to another, and she claims to know how to heal death:

That was how little most people knew of Aes Sedai; death was beyond the power to Heal. Even Marigan seemed to think it was not.

The Fires of Heaven, Chapter 49 'To Boannda' - Nynaeve point of view

It's only an educated guess, but I suspect Moghedien knows how the Nym were created during the 2nd Age. Is it a sure thing? No. But if I had to place a bet on who has the knowledge of how to create a Nym, I'd bet the spider has it. Moghedien is one key for the Nym returning again.

Perhaps a former Tuatha'an like Liandrin will aid the Light in capturing the Spider once again?

9

natasharma: 2010-10-25

With just two books to go. I really doubt there is enough time to bring back or create the Nym again. Although i do believe they will come back, i have my doubts whether it will be before the LB.