To Save Them

I never wanted this position. I thought, staring at my reflection in the glass window, not seeing the green scenery below me. I'd never sought to be this....this charade.
This was not me. I didn't want to do all the things I'd done. I banged my fist against one of the panels, making the glass tremble, before I pushed away, straightening from my half crouch, adjusting the mantel around my shoulders. But they had had to be done.
For the greater good.
I really hoped....hoped that it was for the greater good. My fingers were stained red from the blood of my closest confident, my closest friend, the only man who'd ever seen me as I was, seen me in my vulnerable moment and hadn't betrayed me.
And now. I'd taken his position. Killed my friend, because he asked me to, taken over the power he held.
To another, I suppose, it would have been the sweetest feeling.
To have hundreds of thousands of soldiers at their command.
All of them sworn to obey any order given by their head.
By them.

By me.
I exhaled.
This war had to end.
Let it end today, I prayed quietly, though after all the atrocities I'd committed...I didn't have confidence that anyone above would be listening to me.
Maybe, someday, everyone else would earn the truth.
That they would no longer see me as the tyrant I portrayed myself to be.
Maybe.
But probably never.

I grabbed my sword, buckling it around my waist, before I threw open the door, my façade already in place. "WHAT ARE YOU STANDING THERE FOR?" I roared, glaring at the hapless guard standing in front of my door. "WE HAVE A BATTLE TO PREPARE FOR! GO! NOW! BEFORE I DEMOTE YOU TO SLAVE!"
The guard hesitated, but I was the Head. My word was law.
He sketched a salute before taking off down the hallway at a dead run.

I exhaled, shoulders slumping once he was out of sight. I really hated this façade.

-Inspiration from listening to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 2. Where Snape is Headmaster of Hogwarts