a vitally important question

[gogollescent]

Given the chance, how would you sort the Vorkosigan characters into Hogwarts houses?

Don't look at me like that. This is clearly key information that I am gathering. Is Cordelia the world's most ruthless Hufflepuff, or would she at eleven be hustled off to Ravenclaw, only later in life to develop interpersonal convictions? Does Miles con the hat into putting him into Gryffindor despite the fact that if cut him open you would find a great big S drawn in green on his heart? For that matter, where would Aral have wanted to be put when he was eleven, a pretty formative year for him by any yardstick? Are Illyan and his chip in different houses entirely-- no, don't answer that one--

And so on. 

This inquiry definitely not made for gruesome fusion research purposes of any kind, of course.

Comments

[philomytha]

Ooh, this is tricky! Ivan, for instance, I was going to say, is blatantly a Hufflepuff, but then, the instinctive rescue-kittens-from-trees-without-considering-the-consequences is pure Gryffindor.

I'm tempted to say that Miles Vorkosigan is a Gryffindor and Admiral Naismith a Slytherin... and where will that leave Mark?

Duv, surely, is pure Ravenclaw.

[azurelunatic]

Mark is Slytherin in business dealings, but has enough FOR VORKOSIGAN AND BARRAYAR! HONOR! drilled into him that he jumps Hufflepuff (home, hearth, hard work) if the chips are down.

[gogollescent]

I dunno, though, I almost want to discount that kind of intrafamilial bond; after all, Slytherins are a pretty tightknit bunch, too, going by the most prominent examples we have in the HP books. Loners like Snape and Voldemort are the exception rather than the rule: in general, you've got these claustrophobic old families who serve their own bloodline first and foremost-- which is pretty much in line with Mark's approach to his relations, I think, once he gets over the instinct to assassinate them.

[gogollescent]

Yeah, on thinking about Ivan I'm inclined to throw him in Gryffindor (not least because half the Vor characters we see in the books are so loyal that, if one had them in Hufflepuff on that basis, the population distribution would shortly be out of whack). He's got some things in common with Neville, actually, when I think about it. And he is decidedly not a hard worker.

Heh, funny, I would have flipped the Lord Vorkosigan/Admiral Naismith line-up-- Naismith is after all a very bad mercenary, from the perspective of sensible business practices. But in either case the division does seem fair. Though Mark's a Slytherin, surely? The Noble and Most Ancient House of Jackson. …yes.

Duv is definitely a Ravenclaw, no doubt to the frustration of his father. And his aunt probably was before him, at that.

[philomytha]

I think Aral has to be a Gryffindor, in the end. He WANTS to be honourable and straightforward all the time, and it just sucks for him that his life isn't going to let that be an option; that's why he keeps trying to drink himself to death. Piotr, though, was a very natural Slytherin (unless he's another ruthless Hufflepuff: twenty years of guerrilla warfare suggests an impressive capacity for hard work and persistence in the face of overwhelming odds).

Illyan is a Muggle, tasked with looking after and herding all these mad wizards.

[gogollescent]

Oh god. Imagine Illyan's memory chip acting up every time he spent too much time in Vorkosigan house, as saturated with magic as the place is. Imagine him getting a head injury and having to remind Cordelia not to perform any quick-fix spells, for risk of sending the technology totally haywire. Man and what if some of Barrayar's resistance to modern tech was the result of widespread magical abilities among the inbred upper-caste population? That could be super cool, in an even-more-fucked-up-class-relations sort of way. Hmmm.

[philomytha]

As if life wasn't hard enough for Illyan! Though this might explain ImpSec HQ being quite so granitely forbidding: it's to keep the magic out so that they can run their computers in peace.

But oh yes, of course magical ability is particularly widespread among the purebloods Vor. And there are lots of Issues with who's in control, the magic-wielding Vor or the proles with computers and nerve disruptors...

This is also making me think that maybe Ivan is a Squib ;-).

Gregor has to be a Ravenclaw. 'Let's see what happens' is a very Ravenclaw sort of motto.

[gogollescent]

It could even be that magical ability is what catapulted the Vor to the top during the Time of Isolation-- it's hard to beat Transfiguration as a terraforming tool, I would think. Though given Barrayar's approach to mutation I wonder if Squibs wouldn't quite often be killed off. But I really like the idea of Ivan as a Squib. No doubt the people around him would do a lot of speculating that he's ~suppressed his talents because, that close to the top, it doesn't pay to be a powerful wizard.

Yeah, there's no other house for Gregor. Laisa too: no wonder their children are so frighteningly incisive. Though I suspect he's the first Ravenclaw to pop up in the Vorbarra line for a long time.

[hedda62]

Though I suspect he's the first Ravenclaw to pop up in the Vorbarra line for a long time

I agree with the placement of Gregor; I'm not so sure about the rest of the Vorbarras. Ezar strikes me as quite possibly Gryffindor or Hufflepuff by nature, with a lot of Slytherin tutoring. But I tend to sort Slytherins based on the self-serving goals of their manipulativeness and ambition rather than on the fact of those qualities. I think Ezar sincerely meant to serve the Empire rather than himself (which is, admittedly, an easy thing to say when you're Emperor).

I'd actually rather love to see Serg as a twisted Hufflepuff, too. You know, dedicating himself in a hard-working fashion to depravity. But Slytherin's probably a more accurate choice for him.

I rather suspect Dorca was Slytherin to the bone. Yuri, maybe a Squib! Xav, likely Gryffindor.

[gogollescent]

I think I might be inclined to drop Ezar in Slytherin when I think about, e.g., the whole Escobar scheme; although, I dunno. It was a way of purging the ministries' influence, but there's also that part where-- Aral, I think-- says, "an honorable death was the last thing he could give Serg", which, given the cost of that honorable death, strikes me as very self-and-family-serving. Then again, that's Aral (or possibly Cordelia, it's been a while since I read Sharsd) trying to make Ezar's reasoning more palatable to himself more than anything. I would tend to suspect Ezar of being a case where self-service lined up with serving the Empire, rather than vice versa, but yeah, it's noodly.

Heh, I was thinking Serg might be a Gryffindor, but I can totally see him as a Hufflepuff, admiring Ges and wanting to live up to his high standard of perversion but having to put so much more effort into it. Of course he has the self-interest to make a Slytherin, but then he's missing a lot of that cunning, so…

[hedda62]

There is that "forge ahead and damn the consequences For The Good of Barrayar" aspect to Ezar's horrible war plot that screams Gryffindor to me, but yes, the self-interest part is Slytherin, and whether he cared about Serg's legacy or not, he certainly wasn't self-sacrificing.

And I caught myself thinking that Serg wasn't smart enough to be a Slytherin, but of course that's not really a requirement. However, Gregor certainly didn't get his rational intelligence from that side of the family. (I think Kareen is one of the smarter Gryffindors, or a Slytherin/Gryffindor amalgam, cunning in her self-sacrifice.)

[gogollescent]

Yeah. I am reminded that Dumbledore, after all, was a Gryffindor. No, I think it works, and god knows Ezar has the requisite nerve.

Huh, Kareen is tough. Definitely smart, whatever her house; it sort of makes sense to me that she would end up in Slytherin by default, but exhibit a distinctly Gryffindorish streak later on. Though for her own happiness I sort of wish I could see her in Ravenclaw.

[azurelunatic]

Cordelia might have fancied herself a Ravenclaw until she needed to learn to manage scientists, at which point she embraced her inner Slytherin.

[gogollescent]

I am toying a bit with the idea of Cordelia as a Slytherin-- I can never get over Ezar's line about "I've always felt that theists were more ruthless than atheists", it's one of my favorite quotes from Shards-- though I'm not sure ambition is what's required to command Betan intellectuals. Well, you need some to get the command in the first place, I guess, as demonstrated by her ex-fiance, but even so. On the other hand, she's definitely a capable manipulator once on Barrayar.

[nineveh_uk]

though I'm not sure ambition is what's required to command Betan intellectuals

If they are anything like present-day Earth academics, positively Machiavellian levels of cunning, ambition, and ruthlessness.

[gogollescent]

But these aren't like present-day Earth academics, they are like Earth academics who have been locked in a tin can for a year and armed with ray guns--

--you know, I begin to see your point.

[melannen]

I would say Cordelia is definitely a Slytherin - she's ruthless, she knows what she wants and does what she needs to get it, and doesn't spend a lot of time worrying about it afterward.

I've always put Aral down as Hufflepuff, though; one gets the impression that he would have been perfectly happy just living a quiet life of hard but useful work with the people he loves around him, if it weren't that he's always getting forced into doing great things.

Alys is Ravenclaw, obviously. She even usually wears Ravenclaw colors. (Illyan probably is too.) Ivan and his father were both Gryffindors, though.

Lord Miles Vorkosigan is Slytherin; Admiral Naismith is probably Ravenclaw, actually; but Miles being Miles is fairly Gryffindor.

I can't figure out Gregor, though. Maybe Ravenclaw? It would be interesting to put Gregor in a situation, growing up, where who-he-was-inside was more important than being the Emperor. (On the other hand, the vast majority of Vorbarras have always been Slytherin, so I suspect he would have been put in Slytherin regardless of what the Sorting Hat said, because that's the Imperial house; Cordelia's control over his education can only go so far.)

[gogollescent]

Alys a Ravenclaw, huh? I can sort of see that, from her work as a social spymaster, but at the same time I'm inclined to think she's more of a dynastic Slytherin. She's certainly worked for power and control her whole life. I agree that Illyan's probably a Ravenclaw, although there's a Hufflepuff streak in there somewhere, cf. his relationships with Aral and Alys. Aral Vorkosigan's Badger? Well, possibly not.

You're probably right about Gregor being shunted into Slytherin regardless of preference, though one likes to think the hat is more objective than that. Or maybe Gregor would quietly argue with it until it put him in Hufflepuff, and Cordelia and Aral would breathe a sigh of relief, and Gregor would note it and add it to a private mental file of all the other times that Cordelia and Aral have watched his emerging character for signs of something he barely understands. Poor kid.

Man, Cordelia is turning out to be way more difficult to sort than I thought she would be when I first started out; even as I was thinking about how fun she is as a Slytherin, I started wanting to put her in Gryffindor instead, and highlight her resemblance to Miles in general derring-do. Hm.

[melannen]

I'm not sure Gregor would ever get to *wear* the Hat, is the thing - too much of a political risk, there. (I guess it would depend on how exactly one made the fusion work.)

[gogollescent]

Haha, true-- or he'd be packed off to Durmstrang, which would in any case be a better place to learn all the skills that the supreme ruler of a fantasy-Russian-Empire should have. Like how to wear a really prepossessing fur cape.

[melannen]

Oh, well, if we're adding in the other schools *g*


...Barrayar needs more fur capes. IIRC, there's only one in canon, and that one's Elli's.

[gogollescent]

It ought to import 'em. Boleros and riding boots are all very well, but there's nothing like sentient fur capes for establishing a national fashion sense. At least until the sentient fur cape singularity...

[rymenhild]

Oh, no, Alys is Gryffindor to the bone. It's just that her bravery and heroism are usually displayed in the women's spheres, so the men don't necessarily notice.

[gogollescent]

She is rather chivalrous, isn't she? But I don't think her courage and perseverance define her: instead, they serve her goals and enhance her efficiency.

[melannen]

Hmm, I don't know. I think I would buy an interpretation of Alys as Gryffindor (certainly in a lot of fic where we get to see more of her, she's portrayed that way) and it's not that she's not brave (or manipulative, or hardworking) but her specific canon talents are all about knowing things - she knows fashion, she knows protocol, she knows social history and tradition and law, she knows aesthetics, she knows everyone who's relevant to Barrayaran power and all of their interconnecting relationships, she knows exactly how far she can push things and she knows how to build effective strategies for quiet long-term change - and she's happy doing all those things while being underestimated in the background in a blue-and-silver dress! The things she knows are women's sphere things, too, but it takes just as much intelligence and learning to know them and apply them.

(ETA: Ekaterin, on the other hand, is Gryffindor to the bone. She's all bravery.)

+1000

[gogollescent]

...re: Ekaterin. She's about the only major character whose placement I have no doubts about, if it comes to that.

[raven]

I would put Cordelia, Alys, Miles and Admiral Naismith all firmly in Slytherin! Aral as Gryffindor, yes, and Illyan.... hmm. He's got me baffled. I am sort of tempted to say his real self is a Ravenclaw, but he's acted very Slytherin all his working life.

[gogollescent]

Oh, I don't know-- I wouldn't describe Illyan as ambitious. Almost the opposite; he's very self-effacing, in many ways. Which is no bar to him being cunning or pragmatic, but when divorced from personal gain those strike me as more Ravenclaw properties. As ImpSec chief, he's mostly reactive; he's trying to preserve order, not pursue a new status quo. Though that reasoning gets a bit muddled when I think about all the Slytherins in Harry Potter who never did anything more revolutionary than marry another pureblood and do a bit of government work, so I admit, the case has its flaws.

I might actually put Aral in Slytherin, on the other hand. I think he does think of himself as a Gryffindor or Hufflepuffish type, doing the job in front of him because he has to, not because he derives any relish of it, and deriving most of his power as a leader from personal charisma. So do the people close to him. But, idk, his rapid rise through the military ranks and his interest in Komarr, his excitement beforehand about turning it into a textbook bloodless conquest… It's hard, because we never get his POV, and from an external viewpoint judging his sincerity and the amount of deliberation he puts into how people see him is a tricky proposition. Though it would probably be swinging too far in the other direction to assume a secret motive behind most of his statements to, e.g., Cordelia.

[lannamichaels]

Everyone's a Slytherin. No, really.

[gogollescent]

This actually is almost always what happens to me the first time I try to sort a bunch of characters from a non-HP canon-- I just find Slytherin qualities really charming in a protagonist. But I agree that the cast of the Vorkosigan books is particularly good for it. That's what happens when you make your series all about the well-meaning aristocrats who high-handedly set about to induce widespread change.

[lannamichaels]

That's what happens when you make your series all about the well-meaning aristocrats who high-handedly set about to induce widespread change.

Yeah, and their surrounding characters, like Illyan. Slytherin basically equals any kind of complexity, whether it be of morals or of motives or of anything. Slytherin is only equal to "evil" in the sense that not being a mythological hero or a bookworm who does not exist outside of books ("beware the quiet ones" indicates a level of cunning/sneakiness/underhandedness/playing-nice-so-you-can-get-away-with-stuff, which means Slytherin) or a self-less, again, mythological character, means that you're evil by process of elimination.

Slytherin as written in the books really should be the biggest House ever, since it's everyone who is cunning or driven (aka "ambitious") or sneaky or, um, anything. If you're an interesting character, you're probably a Slytherin, because otherwise, you're not particularly interesting.

(Is it very obvious I love Snape/Harry? ;) )

[gogollescent]

One of the frustrating things about the HP books is that they establish these interesting if rather fragile categories and then go ahead and spend the next several thousand pages talking, in the main, about Gryffindors, who are necessarily varied enough to make one wonder why anyone takes sorting seriously at all, when you have Peter Pettigrew in under the umbrella of "courageous". But yeah, when the abilities to prioritize and solve problems without martyring yourself and run cost-benefit analysis on a situation are all repeatedly described as Slytherin traits, it gets a little hard to find plot-furthering, competent adult characters who wouldn't fit comfortably within that purview.

(It's been a while since I read any Harry Potter fic that wasn't a Homestuck crossover, but when I did I was pretty fond of Snape/Harry too. Though I think my tolerance for Snape himself has lowered a little in the intervening period-- more because of his Gryffindor qualities than his Slytherin ones, aha. All that damn everlasting unrequited love!)

[legionseagle]

I agree. Except for Simon Illyan, who I think of as a Hufflepuff (who but a Hufflepuff would have volunteered for that chip in the first place?) and Ekaterin, who's a Gryffindor.

[lannamichaels]

Simon's a spy then spymaster; hence Slytherin. ;)

[legionseagle]

Slytherin's ambition, Hufflepuff's duty. I submit that Simon, while successful, is successful without being personally ambitious (and he gets the job by being in the right (wrong?) place at the right time).

[intermezzo]

Awesome post! I still need to think about this, but...JSYK, I'd SO read that fic! :)))))

[gogollescent]

I appreciate that. I will certainly link it here if I ever finish!

[reginagiraffe]

I'm no expert so I'd love to hear peoples' thoughts on Mark. Especially Mark vs. Killer/Gorge/Grunt/Howl. (Sort all *those* if you dare. :D)

[gogollescent]

Haha, I'd want to put them each in a different house! But that's just my passion for even divisions talking. Um. Thusfar I think the consensus has been that he's a Slytherin with perhaps a Hufflepuff streak, but I'm inclined to dump the Black Gang in Gryffindor, actually...

[crisis_control]

My first instinct pegs Aral as Gryffindor (although I buy the argument about him being a Puff, his early self strikes me as a bit too violent and idealistic (and violently idealistic...)), Miles as rule-breaker type Gryffindor (Miles is probably a bit -- a lot -- like Harry; the Hat probably stalled between Gryffindor and Slyth, and Miles would sweet talk it into sorting him into Gryffindor, because, you know, Vorthalia the Bold. Plus, his lack of ambition for Gregor's camp stool). Illyan as a Ravenclaw (inclining towards a Slytherclaw, really)- he can be sneaky, he can be hardworking, but he sure loves his data. (I can actually see him volunteering for the chip, because of the sheer shiny attraction of something that could possibly make him smarter.)

Cordelia I'd place as a Hat-stall. She reminds me of McGonagall, and ultimately I'd slide her into Gryffindor (with her views on the Vor, she's probably not enough of a pureblood fanatic to be Slytherin although she certainly has many characteristics of one), though it's a very close shave with Ravenclaw.

Mark I'd peg as a Slytherin. He's certainly sharp enough, he doesn't share that brand of heroism that Miles does (though he has his own). Strangely enough, I can also see him as a Hufflepuff.

Ivan - is really hard for me. He screams Hufflepuff to me, except for the laziness...

Having said that, I think what this very fascinating discussion shows is that - people really can be placed in all kinds of different Houses, depending on what you define as their defining characteristic and the the House's defining characteristic :) It must be a pain, being the Sorting Hat...

[gogollescent]

Yeah, I mean, sorting is fun because it's so ambiguous and subjective, but then also kind of worrying, when you think about how many lifelong ramifications it seems to have for the characters in the Harry Potter universe. Such trust to place in singing millinery. Makes you wonder whether the Hat's standards have changed at all over the years, too.

I agree that what we know about Aral's past is very Gryffindorish-- he may have since matured to a point where he exhibits a lot of other House traits, they weren't all there from the beginning, so to speak. And yeah, Miles would totally do the Harry thing if he could. Though, being Miles, it might not take the form of a single firm request but rather a two-week long campaign pre-Sorting to woo the Hat over to his side. You can see him asking Cordelia: "What does a hat really want in life? Unlife?" It's important to have ammunition.

I think my doubts about Illyan-as-Ravenclaw mostly have to do with the fact that he sort of has to love his data as a requirement of his job, and we know little enough about his pre-chip life that it's hard to judge how much of that is also intrinsic.

We have definitely had convincing arguments for Cordelia in every house at this point, damn her. Maybe, as with Gregor, I'll pack her off to Beauxbatons and sidestep the issue. Beauxbetans. Oh, god.

[crisis_control]

*laugh* Beauxbetans in all its punnish glory is fantastic. She probably looks upon all the Sorting as archaic and a little crazy, and probably lobbies for the entire system to be abolished...

Miles, possibly the first person to ask the Hat what its elephant is.

Re Illyan - hm, I think what calls out to me is that his very dispassionate observer status and the ability to hold multiple realities in his head strikes me as very much a Claw trait. Baby!Illyan in Shards isn't a Slytherin either, and too fade-into-the-background to be Gryff or Puff...

[gogollescent]

/nod Defining people so early in their lives would almost certainly strike her as dangerous-- "maybe we could initiate them with a powerpoint about the careful use of recreational drugs instead", she says, but somehow her suggestion doesn't fly. This generation. It's only a matter of time!

Miles: "It can't spend the whole year composing song lyrics, can it?" Two months later he, Ivan, and the Hat run off to start a boy band.

I think perhaps the invisibility is what makes me want to suspect him of Hufflepuffery, in combination with his youthful self's endearing confusion over how to balance his liking and loyalty towards Aral with his duties to Negri. On the other hand, it does seem like if anyone would survive the implanting of the memory chip, it'd be a Ravenclaw, prepared and even eager to process all that stimulus in the name of a cohesive picture.

[hedda62]

Well, to get back to your original question, what if Simon is a Ravenclaw and the chip is a Hufflepuff? Or the other way around? (I do suffer greatly from anthropomorphic tendencies, if you couldn't tell.)

Miles and the Hat would be a great name for a band. (somehow I think Ivan would be outvoted in the naming process)

Not sure I want to know what happens if the hat and the chip get together.

[gogollescent]

It… would be pretty adorable if the chip were Hufflepuff to his Ravenclaw. Oh, Simon.

Ivan's only there to carry the drums (and the groupies), poor lad. Or maybe they let the hat do the transporting for them, given its mystical abilities to teleport objects into the hands of its wearer. Ruby-encrusted sword, immortal bird, tambourines…

Hah! That's presumably what happens when Illyan tries to track down the errant musicians and through a hilarious series of events gets entangled in their creative schemes, culminating in his live cover of Memory.

[hedda62]

culminating in his live cover of Memory.

*dies* *just dies*

[gogollescent]

Next divisive discussion topic: the Vorkosigan characters as breeds of practical cat.

[kiezh]

Late to the party...

I don't really understand sorting Cordelia anywhere but Ravenclaw. Think about her backstory - high-achieving misfit geek, manipulated out of her first chance at captaincy by her ex (which does not argue for ambition or ability to scheme on her part), "let's see what happens." She didn't come equipped with those formidable social and political skills, she built them based on her observations throughout her life, which is very Ravenclaw. Her first instinct in any situation isn't to act, it's to analyze. Then she'll act, decisively, if she decides it's best. But she'll always think first. (And during. And after.)

Gregor is also a Ravenclaw, and is more like Cordelia than Miles is, in some ways. The books mention several times how Gregor uses Cordelia's phrases, analyzes her in turn, and has the same kind of unsettlingly thoughtful gaze.

Miles is such a Gryffindor. What he wants most to give everyone in the universe is rescue. Seriously.

Aral... I like the idea above that Aral is a Gryffindor who has been forced to act against his instincts his whole life long, which is the cause of a lot of his pain and self-destructive habits. And Piotr, who is definitely a Slytherin, doesn't understand why his son can't shape up and show some cunning and ambition.

I don't get why a lot of people in fandom want to make everyone they like a Slytherin; that kind of defeats the whole idea of sorting. (Which is not that great an idea to begin with, in HP canon.) Many interesting characters are not particularly ambitious, or are cunning in the service of other priorities!

I don't think many of the main characters in the Vorkosigan saga are Slytherins. Piotr, yes. Ezar, I can see. Mark, definitely yes. (Of the family-protecting Mine Or Not Mine type, who care very intensely about a small list of people.) Maybe Elli's a Slytherin, actually. (Elena's a Gryffindor, and I think her father may have been one too, albeit terribly damaged.) I could buy Lady Alys... she did, after all, marry the best catch of her generation, which is what an ambitious young lady in her position might want. (Padma was the son of a princess, wealthy, handsome, kind, etc. Aral and Serg were higher ranked but, for different reasons, not good prospects.) And then she ended up as the Imperial Hostess and the queen of high society for decades. Not to mention a spy. Yes, I'd say Alys is Slytherin.

I think there are a ton of brave Ravenclaws and thoughtful Gryffindors floating around, partly because Bujold is at her best when she's writing ethical intellectuals. I'm not sure who's a Hufflepuff. Kou and Drou? Ooh, Kareen the younger, definitely. And that's why she balances Mark. Ivan I can't place. I want to say Hufflepuff for loyalty, but hard work? Nah. Maybe Gryffindor. (Which puts Alys in the same position as Piotr, a ruthlessly ambitious parent who doesn't understand why their child doesn't want what they want.)

Okay, stopping there. It is a really interesting exercise, even if I think the Sorting in the HP universe was incredibly toxic. It makes you think about what people's core characteristics are.

[gogollescent]

I guess the difficulty I have is that what you describe aligns pretty closely with, e.g., Hermione's arc and characterization, too; so it's evidently possible for one to be a misfit geek and analytical while not having those be one's defining attributes (by the weird and oversimplistic yardstick of a magic hat, I mean). Though it's probably fair to say that Hermione is in Gryffindor as much because it was easier for the author to set up in-House friendships as because she belonged there, much as with the personalities of the various Marauders a generation earlier. I think part of the thing with Aral and Cordelia and such is also that, because we do see them as adults first and only get a minimal sense of their difficult adolescences, it's tempting to look at their learned skills and habits over their root natures. Though even as an eleven year old I would argue that Cordelia was probably not a little Hufflepuffish; brilliant and inquisitive, sure, but also very much dedicated, and loyal to a fault. Her social skills are learned, but what Aral terms her ability to carry around civilization with her-- that instinctual sense of duty-- is not.

I feel like Miles wants to be the rescuer as much as he wants to give everyone a rescue, which is why, while I agree that he probably ends up a Gryffindor, I don't think it's all that clear-cut. Even as an adult, post-Admiral Naismith and settled into his role as Lord Vorkosigan, his first response to hearing that someone else has saved to day is to think "Well, I could have done so just as well!" He then goes back and acknowledges that the thought is unworthy, because he is an adult and he's grown a lot from his seventeen-year-old-heroing, but it's because he's grown away from that knight errant strain that he can moderate his own competitiveness and desire for glory. Though now he's starting to sound like James Potter, so I may have talked myself into a corner here.

As for why people in fandom are Slytherin-happy, speaking for myself, I think part of it is the fact that Sorting is such a terrible idea, and ends up with things like a quarter of the population being deemed ubiquitously untrustworthy: the contrary streak in me makes me automatically want to see if I can't apply the description of Slytherin to heroic types. But yeah, as an actual thing to do to real people, and children at that-- completely toxic.

(I really like the Alys-Piotr parallel. I can only imagine what she would have done to the Cetagandans.)