Quote Originally Posted by Deadly View Post
It's dark, yes, and potentially very sad, depending on how it ends (which naturally I'm not revealing ), but I don't see that it would be any darker than LotR or Harry Potter, both of which have their dark moments.

She's facing a very dark future, there doesn't seem to be much hope, any moment she could die and/or lose everything ... seems almost like a description of LotR right there
I think there's a bit of a difference. In LotR, they suffer and the world looks bleak, but at some level you always know they're going to destroy that ring. From the moment of the pledge at the Council of Elrond, that strength and that purpose drive the story.

Now, I haven't read your story, but I think that a lot of dark pony fanfiction, in general tends to spend more time reveling in the suffering. Readers get upset because the ponies are in such a happy world and many authors seem to delight in making them suffer and be miserable, and there's always the possibility of a story having a Hamlet style ending. So people get a little antsy when they see a fanfic labeled dark because it doesn't have that sense of pervading hope that keeps your head up when you're reading LotR.