I dunno if you've ever heard about this, but there's something those of
us who are, you know, adults, call 'sex'.

What is this, you may ask? Well, if you don't know, and you seem not to,
I will gladly explain it in simplistic terms to you, but the essence is,
that's how children are born.


Now, what happens if a child's parents die? Why, they become orphans!
So, since the amount of orphans in Shallam and Ashtan both remains
pretty static, it's pretty clear that they're being populated solely by
births, not rebirths. If an orphan visits the halls of Maya, and comes
back as an orphan (and there is no reason to assume that they come back
at -all-, since it is at Maya's discretion as to whether or not we
return), and yet there are these births, and parent deaths, then the
orphan population should be increasing, not staying the same.

That said, when an orphan dies in Ashtan, it's clear that it dies. Your
law gives them no way to say "Hey, you know, this person just sent me to
be -murdered-. I demand he be kicked out of the city" As has been
pointed out, the Divine themselves have said the orphanage kills them,
yet you give them no way to press charges.

In Shallam, no orphan runs away, again, because the population seems to
remain stable. Not to mention, if they truly ran away, you kinda suspect
they'd not follow the next person with a candle. Maybe that's too
complex for your mind to grasp, but it seems pretty evident to me.

Penned by my hand on the 6th of Valnuary, in the year 396 AF.