"Merlin, Severus! What do you think, that muggles are the only ones capable of being cruel? I'm not standing here in front of you and telling you that the world is good or that people are." And it wasn't as if he hadn't known, pretty much from the beginning, that Severus suffered at home. He had never thought much of it, because back then that had seemed like the norm. All the children in his family were scared of their parents to varying degrees. "Do you think it makes it better when my mother forces me to kneel, to beg, to scream in pain, just because she uses a wand instead of her hand? Is that noble?"

He shook his head. "It's people that are evil, that are rotten. Doesn't matter how pure they are."