Suddenly, it wasn't only Newlin's mind that was open to him, but every mind in the room. And in them all, he saw the same thing.
Hunger.
Hunger for power. For knowledge. For acceptance. For sex. For Galleons. For all the tiny, insignificant things that a human heart craved, the things that were common as dirt.
This was the key point in your story for me, when I felt that I understood what you were saying. I think you have pointed out something profound here, about human weakness, and I love that. Of course as a reader it hurts too, because Harry is the crucible of this revelation, and your Harry is so deeply flawed, even verging on unlikeable. I take my hat off to you for writing such an uncompromising portrait of a man in what, for want of a better phrase, I have to call mid-life crisis.
It really hurt me that Harry's understanding of Ginny was so one-dimensional, but I know that's down to a combination of the limits of his perception, and the lies he's telling himself to justify his actions.
Oh Harry. It hurts so badly that he cares so little for his children. The final scene in Corsica was for me in no way triumphant, in no way a release or a moment of beauty, I just felt how horribly compromised he was, how completely selfish he is, how unaware of the pain of his children at their absent father.
Klynie, I think this story is a triumph of realism, of flawed human nature. I can't say I liked it, because it hurt too much, but I think it's really really good, and I'll be thinking about it for a long time.