"There's probably something better but I can't think what right now." Hug. "Maybe it'll change soon enough anyway as the world gets richer."

"More people'll donate to the orphanages, at least."

"And if they die they can come back and their children won't be orphaned at all, hopefully."

"Yeah."

"Godspring's stopped again. I'm keeping the portal closed for the time being, handling it with the door. Since there'll be a lot of problems. Might go outside and sing a little."

"Can I come listen?"

"Of course."

So Cir follows him out and snuggles up and loves loves loves him.

And he endeavors not to dwell on whether this was at all a defensible use of that much money - he couldn't not have done it, he couldn't let Cir forget everything, he couldn't help humans without Cir. Or at least he'd be worse at it.

He sings.

He imagines tiny Cir in an orphanage.

Cir looks up at him quizzically.

Pet pet. "I'm really glad you're safe."

"Me too. What were you thinking about -?"

"The kids in the orphanage got so - competitive - over the prospect of parents -"

"...yeah. I think I punched somebody."

Squeeze. "I suppose I shouldn't be glad you did."

"I'm not sure it actually helped me any, the mages give little tests and stuff."

"They said. The smartest and healthiest, so you had the most to spend."

"Yeah. Didn't hurt I was cute."

"I bet you were." Squeeze. "Do you think we should try to get Elf mages?"

"How much trouble would Elves have with having to be careful who they touch?"

"Over any given timespan not a lot, but over forever there'd be accidents."

"Anybody but redmages can just not use it. If they're not too impulsive. But I think it'd be hard to talk the Temple-Guilds into it."

"Liatsi was optimistic that better opportunities for orphans and a wealthier society might produce some theological changes. I - think she behaves as she would if your world had no gods, if that makes any sense? My father does that sometimes but it's more annoying with him since our gods are very around, maybe it makes sense in a world like yours."

"I mean, the gods don't mostly do things."

" - yeah but if theology is that responsive to local political realities then you really wouldn't expect it to have any correspondence to reality."