Oh, the problem I had was not with Snape- his character change made sense, it was just that he was cautioning Harry and Hermione against further use of the dark arts and going overboard with the violence, then this warning turned out to be a huge waste of time because the two of them suffered no lasting character changes.

 

The author's other fic, Echos in the Fog or whatever, does show them with changes. Well, mostly just Harry. Not saying your criticism is invalid or wrong or anything, just pointing that if you're looking for more, you might find it there.

 

It's not perfect, but it's certainly an enjoyable read. Dark Harry still retains most of his canon personality, which is pretty rare. One of the more believable descent-into-grimdark stories I've read. 4/5 from me.

 

I think the best thing about this story is the point of divergence. I find it novel, and I find Harry and Hermione's reactions believable. Murdering Draco, while drastic, makes sense to me seeing as Ron has just been murdered.

I hate how easily they tear through the Death Eaters. They encounter some paltry resistance (Hermione held hostage at wand point) but really breeze through everything. The biggest obstacle they encounter is them wrestling with their own morality, but all we get of that is Harry and Hermione crying together after they've tortured Bellatrix and then fucked. Hell, Dumbledore doesn't even push back against them in any meaningful way. He's disappointed but goes along with their plan after one conversation.

This is where the length hurts it, I feel. If we'd actually gotten some progression in Harry and Hermione's morality and their descent into the Dark Arts, instead of that one scene, I think it'd be an improvement. If we'd actually seen them try and take out some Death Eaters, failing some, overcoming obstacles, taking losses...this fic would be much better. Instead, we get a lot of time spent in Grimmauld after the fact.

As it is, I love the inciting incident and like the initial characterization but wish it expanded more on their progression. There was no real challenge and I felt no real stakes after Ron's death.

3/5 because I like the idea a whole lot and didn't think there was anything technically wrong with the writing. Jus wish was better structured.

 

I really liked this one. The only complaint I have is the brevity, which meant a few important characterization moments got skipped. As others have pointed out, it would have been better to have an additional chapter early on, showing us H and Hr's descent into using torture, dark curses, etc. That transition happened a bit too quickly, but it felt like they still retained their canon personalities and some ethics.

It's still a well-told story. The pace and the time-skips mean we have to put the pieces of the puzzle together as we go, which is an engaging, suspenseful experience. There was no spoon-feeding here, just the most important moments. Sometimes that's a virtue.

4/5

 

This was a pretty interesting story. The point of divergence and initial story seed introduced here is one I've wanted to see implemented before, but haven't seen done in a fanfiction, so that was neat. On the positive end, the story is competently written and I think overall generally well paced in terms of the overall story beats, though there are a couple of issues there that I'll get to later. I buy Harry's initial descent, and I can definitely see him (as well as Hermione) deciding to follow through with killing Malfoy, given Ron's death. This is also a rare story that I think has a Harry / Hermione pairing that makes sense, respects the agency of both characters, and though Ron's death is the catalyst for this to occur, it doesn't feel like the typical scenario in most H/Hr stories where Ron is either sidelined, bashed, or castigated to make the pairing happen. That Ron's memory is respected, that Hermione is conflicted about being with Harry given her feelings about Ron, and that Ron shows up at the end at King's Cross really helps to solidify that, so I appreciate that aspect of the story. The evolution of Snape's relationship with Harry and Hermione is overall one I can buy, even if some of the moment to moment dialogue feels a bit off at times, and I think it was a pretty neat dynamic overall.

In terms of the negatives, there are a few that are significant enough that hold this story back from being genuinely excellent in my opinion. As others have mentioned in this thread, Harry (and Hermione) delve into not just the Dark Arts but overall pretty extreme behavior rapidly, brutally torturing and killing their adversaries. I do buy them killing Malfoy, but the rapid evolution of their characters continuing from that didn't seem fully developed. In relation to this, and more regarding this point later on, there doesn't seem to be much pushback or consequence otherwise to Harry and Hermione taking on these characteristics - outside of a small and ultimately throwaway line from Snape, there's no real discussion or development of the moral issues posed by the path Harry and Hermione are following and things mostly seem to simply go their way. From a pacing perspective, the story lacks a well executed bridge from Harry and Hermione's characters roughly as they were in canon to where they end up in the story ultimately. Even Harry in canon at his worst in using a Cruciatus Curse on Amycus Carrow or liberally using the Imperius Curse in the middle of a war doesn't go anywhere near as far as where Harry and Hermione end up in this story.

The story reads more like Harry and Hermione as forces of nature plowing through all obstacles in their path, as opposed to meaningfully facing challenges for them to overcome as one would imagine in the rising arc and climax of the story. Even Harry's defeat of Voldemort and his survival reads like a foregone conclusion, as we're not even presented those events as occurring dramatically different from canon, but rather view them ex post facto in the epilogue chapter, which only further cements the situation of Harry and Hermione barreling through all obstacles in their path. If the story instead were intended to focus on Harry and Hermione's changing characters, I'd argue again that the story fails to accomplish this by a lack of meaningful interrogation and examination of these changes as there is no real discussion or pushback of these changes by the other characters of the story nor are there consequences for these choices more generally. Even when Harry meets his parents and others via the Stone or meets Dumbledore later on, all of this is otherwise handwaved away as Harry making wartime decisions.

My biggest issue with the story is that, given how Harry and Hermione take such a dark turn and how this is meant to be a point of divergence - presumably keeping what was true regarding the series beforehand fixed and true - I kept waiting for the proverbial pin to drop. That is to say, as a divergence, for there to be some meaningful difference or consequence for Harry and Hermione's decisions to take the path they had taken in the story. We're told for example by Dumbledore in canon that killing splits the soul, so I partly expected Harry's actions - made in the heat of the moment and then carried throughout the story in terms of delving deeper and deeper into a dark path - to have real, meaningful consequences down the line. One could perhaps argue that Lupin and Dean Thomas's deaths provide this, but I don't think this goes far enough in terms of the overall trajectory and resolution of the story, and ultimately it doesn't convincingly read that their deaths are owing to Harry and Hermione's specific actions anymore so than war has casualties.

Perhaps as a poignant and bittersweet resolution, Harry damages his soul to the point that things don't resolve as neatly as they did in canon - with Harry dying for real, or stuck in Limbo like Voldemort, or some other meaningful difference and consequence as owing to this overall divergence. But in the end, barring Ron's death as the initial point of divergence, things more or less end up the same as they did in canon, with Voldemort defeated, the horcrux in Harry removed, and no lasting consequences to Harry and Hermione owing to the path they chose to forge. I'm not saying that some of the suggestions I made regarding Harry's fate had to occur, but one would expect there to be some meaningful consequence to Harry and Hermione's decisions; in other words, that their taking a different path from canon made an actual difference. This is particularly pressing when juxtaposed against the chain of events in canon, which particularly makes it seem like Harry and Hermione's decision to take such a dark path seem otiose as the same destination was reached either way. I'm left scratching my head then ultimately as to what the overall point, thesis, or theme of the story is meant to be, and I don't think the story succeeds in presenting a coherent one at the end of the day.

As a related sidenote, this aspect of the story overall - and particularly given how the conversation with Harry's loved ones via the Stone as well as with Dumbledore and Ron goes - reads like the stereotypical "hard man needs to make hard choices." I've personally grown somewhat tired of this overall kind of story trope, and it also seems unconvincing from a metanarrative level if one just looks at canon where Harry doesn't engage in anywhere near the level of brutality displayed in this story and still more or less ends up in the same place, which makes further unconvincing that Harry's actions in the story were truly necessary or justified.

Overall, a 3/5 seems right for the story for having an interesting point of divergence, an actually developed and well done H/Hr pairing, competent writing and respect for the characters involved, but otherwise held back by some pretty serious flaws in my opinion. Were it not for those aspects as well as developing a rarely seen and interesting point of divergence in the fandom, I'd be more inclined to rate this lower and more harshly.