"That you are clever and ambitious, nothing more or less," he answers, with a small, sad smile. It was what the Hat told every new student, what every professor would say if asked what the house stood for. Slytherin had always been a hotbed of pureblood prejudices, it was true, but it had been far less prominent in the past -- or perhaps more subtle, he thinks.

"I know that the Slytherin house has come to be associated with far uglier things than its intended purpose. I suppose when an overthrow of power is in the air, it follows that those with ambitious drives would be the ones most invested in it," he says with a slight sigh. "But it does not mean that all those who are sent there are -- or ever would be -- one of those who wish to support such things."