Mayalaran

Mayalaran is a deadeye cultivationspren who was bonded to an Edgedancer before the Recreance. She is currently the Shardblade of Adolin Kholin, who nicknames her Maya. 
== Appearance and Personality ==
=== Appearance ===
Maya's appearance in Shadesmar is that of a woman with scratches around her eyes like faded scars. Previous to Ba-Ado-Mishram’s release, she had no eyes, and looked like a painting with the features scratched out rather than simply empty sockets. Her features seem to be made of ashen brown cords the thickness of hair, giving her skin the appearance of rough cloth, string or brown vines. She has crystalline hands with long nails.
In the Physical Realm, Maya appears as a Shardblade. The blade itself is shaped like a larger version of a standard longsword, and bears some resemblance to the enormous two-handed broadswords traditionally wielded by the Horneaters. The cutting edge is smooth and sinuous, like an eel, while the back has ridges of crystal. When summoned, the mist it forms from is in the shape of vines.
=== Personality ===
As a deadeye, Maya was non-verbal and expressed almost no personality. Her personality began to slowly reemerge after the trial at Lasting Integrity, and then truly began to return in force after visiting the reawakened Urithiru.She has a solid grasp on tactics and strategic thinking, and thinking about it helps her focus. She is old-fashioned, and considers herself a soldier. 
Unlike spren like Syl or Pattern, who are “innocent in the ways of romance and intimacy,” she has lived her life around soldiers, and so enjoys crass jokes, including teasing Adolin by calling him a slut and using tactical lingo as innuendo. She supports Adolin very much, and encourages him to seek the help he needs. She challenges his self-defeating ideas and tries to push him to heal, because she is grateful for the healing he helped her find. She is familiar with the Fused from her time with previous Radiants, being able to identify Abidi the Monarch when he appears at the Azish Oathgate.
Like many of the true spren, Maya considers the honorspren to be stuffy and boring.
Adolin is relieved to hear her laugh in Azimir before the occupation.
== Attributes and Abilities ==
=== Bond to Adolin ===
Maya and Adolin have a unique bond of an unknown nature. It does not grant Adolin surgebinding and he does not swear oaths, but it has revived Maya from her deadeye state, restoring her ability to communicate. As of Wind and Truth, she can speak mentally with Adolin. Their communication works even across great distances, though it becomes limited to feelings and individual words. Adolin can see through her eyes in Shadesmar, and he can summon her without the standard ten heartbeat wait. She can change her shape, but not nearly to the extent of a radiant spren.
Like all the Unoathed, she can be summoned as a blade. After Retribution’s creation, this is a unique trait among unbonded spren and deadeyes. According to Maya, this is a side-effect of the reforged Oathpact. She can also travel to Shadesmar, even after Stormfall, which is an ability unique to her.She is able to swim through the beads to quickly travel Shadesmar, like all deadeyes. She is able to communicate with other deadeyes, including recruiting them and asking them for help. During the battle for the Azish Oathgate leading up to the contest of champions, she used these abilities to gather around fifty deadeyes, nine of whom worked with her to form the Unoathed.
== History ==
=== The Recreance ===
Mayalaran was killed by her bonded Edgedancer when they abandoned their oaths, believing that the Nahel bond would bring about the destruction of Roshar the way it had for humanity's homeworld, Ashyn. During Adolin's trial, she reveals that she, along with all the other deadeyes, had chosen to sacrifice themselves through the Recreance: they were willing partners to the end of the Knights Radiant.
At some point before the War of Reckoning, Adolin dueled a lighteyes named Tinalar. Against everyone's expectations, he won the duel and secured Maya as his own. At the time, her name was unknown to anyone living. Believing it to be pretentious to give her one that wasn't hers, Adolin left her unnamed.
=== The War of Reckoning (1167-1174) ===
Adolin often spoke to Maya and imagined that she listened to him. He believed that something that seemed like an extension of the soul itself was impossible to wield without feeling as though it too was alive. This in turn may account for some of the differences in the relationship between Adolin and Mayalaran in regards to other deadeye spren.
Maya was one of the shards placed on the line in Adolin and Dalinar's dueling campaign to disarm the Shardbearers of the Highprinces. The most important duel of these was the one against Relis, Elit, Abrobadar and Jakamav. She was also present in many battles, including the Battle of the Tower and the Battle of Narak.
=== The True Desolation (1174-) ===
Adolin talked with Maya before he, Kaladin, Shallan and Elhokar stormed Kholinar Palace. He acknowledged that she was a dead spren and that he was sorry there was nothing he could do to fix that. He thanked her for all the years they've fought together and promised to try and use her only to do good.
Maya and Adolin met for the first time when he crossed over into Shadesmar with Shallan, Kaladin, Vivenna, Pattern and Sylphrena from the corrupted Oathgate in Kholinar. Pattern informed them all that Maya is quite dead. Usually, she trailed after Adolin, but when he didn't move, she remained motionless, and to go elsewhere she had to be lead by the hand. 
When travelling with the Reachers, Maya was locked in a small room in the cargo hold by Captain Ico, who introduced the term "deadeye" to the group. He told Adolin that deadeyes wouldn't watch where they're going, which is why he couldn't have her on deck. He wasn't happy with Adolin's attitude towards her, telling him that he should not pretend Maya is his friend, and that she was only a tool to him. 
At the Thaylen City Oathgate in Shadesmar, Maya protected Adolin from one of the Fused without prompting and as a result she was stabbed with a sword, but didn't react beyond screeching. Later, once they reached Thaylen City proper, she and Adolin faced the thunderclast. Adolin believed she was made to fight them, being overly long for dueling, and that she wanted to fight because it reminded her of when she was alive. In response, she told him her name. During their fight, Adolin was able to summon her in only seven heartbeats after he pled with her to appear before the thunderclast caught him. After being too injured to continue, he loaned Maya to Hrdalm, to which she responded with a sense of resigned agreement.
=== Resurrection ===
Maya has been at least partially revived. She regains consciousness during Adolin's trial by witness in Lasting Integrity while under physical restraint and emotional stress, in order to prevent the honorspren judge from using her as a witness to condemn Adolin for the Recreance. Maya explains that she willingly took that risk, knowing that it was possible that the spren would die when their Radiants forsook their oaths. She did not know that she would become a deadeye, but did accept the possibility of death.
Once partially revived, Maya did not return fully to her pre-deadeye form. Her eyes remain scratched out, but she is able to speak and converse. Her thoughts and speech seem slightly slow or off, although that may simply be due to being newly revived and overwhelmed. Being revived did not create a Nahel bond between Adolin and Maya, though Adolin notes that he can sense her emotions and awareness, which is not part of a Nahel bond. 
Upon their return to Urithiru, Maya began to change relatively quickly, having been reinvigorated by the light of the tower. This is when she and Adolin developed the ability to speak into each other’s minds and see through each other’s eyes.
=== Battle of Azimir ===
Adolin brought Maya with him to the Battle of Azimir on the third of the final ten days. They talked about strategy together, and Maya explained doing so helped her focus. She, from Shadesmar, scouted out the enemy forces and reported on them to him. He fought the first waves of the siege using her, and then asked if she wanted to give his soldiers a chance to feel what it was like to hold a shardblade. She wanted to join the mens’ celebrations, so she agreed and dulled her edge so that they could safely hold her. 
The night of the third day, Maya spoke with Adolin, worrying that their reinforcements might be blocked by the Fused. She suggested that she go through Shadesmar to recruit spren, insisting that they could be helpful. Adolin agreed, and so she left. As she traveled, she could communicate a limited amount with Adolin, but only feelings of reassurance and then singular words. She continued to travel and find deadeyes for five days, and by the ninth day, she had gotten close enough to returning to be able to communicate more. On the night of the ninth day, Adolin was fighting on the front lines of the siege, and began to lose hope. Maya spoke to his mind, encouraging him and reassuring him that she was almost back.
On the morning of the tenth day, as Adolin was fighting Abidi the Monarch, she finally arrived back at Azir. She brought around fifty deadeyes with her, and nine of them, together with Maya herself, formed the Unoathed. The Unoathed were able to hold the throne room until the deadline arrived, ending the conflict officially, with Azimir, and by extension the entire country of Azir, safe.
=== Post-Stormfall ===
After Stormfall, Maya traveled to Urithiru through Shadesmar. As Radiants could no longer use their powers, and the Oathgates no longer functioned, this was the only way they had to reach Urithiru. She returned to report to Adolin and the other leaders at Azimir that Dalinar was dead and that Urithiru had been surrounded by “a strange glass bubble” which prevented people traveling to or from it in the Physical Realm. She also relayed the fact that Radiants at Urithiru could still use their powers, and that Ba-Ado-Mishram had been freed.
Ba-Ado-Mishram’s liberation began healing all deadeyes across Roshar. For Maya, this included the return of her eyes, which until that point, had been scratched out.
== Notes ==
category: Shardblades
es:Mayalaran