A/N: I was very intrigued by what was going on with Draco during sixth year and couldn't help writing a story that explored his relationships with Pansy, Crabbe, Goyle, his parents, and of course Myrtle. Reviews are always welcome and appreciated. Enjoy!

Many thanks to TheGiantSquid for beta-reading this for me!

Warning: This has been edited from NC-17 to R, but there is still mention of sexual acts and some swearing.

Cold Eyes

By: Mizaya

The long walk back to the dungeons was more tedious than usual. Somehow Filch managed to cross his path twice on the way, although Draco avoided detection by ducking first behind a statue and then into the History of Magic classroom. He supposed that Crabbe and Goyle, whom he'd sent along ahead of him, had been as noisy as Mountain Trolls and forewarned the Groundskeeper that students were out when they shouldn't be. Actually, Draco had sent Crabbe and Goyle before him to distract Filch so he himself wouldn't get caught again—one trip to Snape's office had been more than sufficient—but he had been sloppy in his reasoning of late, not planning things as well as he should have.

Draco didn't need Filch or Snape interfering with his work; it was frustrating enough as it was. He'd felt so close last week, when he'd actually heard Borgin haggling with a customer through the open cabinet, but his success had been short-lived. The next day, he'd made a foolhardy attempt to solidify the connection with a Permanent Sticking Charm and spoiled most of his progress.

He was relieved that he'd been working without a lookout that day; Crabbe and Goyle were as thick-headed as giants, but he didn't need them letting it slip to Goyle's father or family friends that Draco Malfoy had left his task to go have a cry in the bathroom. No, he was under close enough scrutiny as it was, and time was rapidly running out. If he failed a third time to kill Dumbledore, or if he couldn't fix the Vanishing Cabinet...

Draco pushed the thought out of his head, evading the temptation to return to that second floor toilet again.

He didn't want to admit it to himself, but he'd found comfort in crying with that dead girl. Ironic, that he should feel anything less than hatred for a Mudblood killed by the Dark Lord's basilisk and who wished to see Potter in the prefects' bathroom again, but somehow he hadn't minded sharing his tears of anger and desperation with her.

The day he'd stumbled upon her—the day he'd lost the feeble connection between the Vanishing Cabinets—he hadn't been expecting to sit in a stall and sob for an hour. He'd gone to the bathroom to skive off class, and perhaps throw something heavy at a mirror to let off steam. He'd been so close to his goal, damn his hastiness. Throw something he did – a half empty rubbish bin that bounded off the obviously Charmed glass and ricocheted to hit a stall door, banging it open and revealing an unexpected sight: a shimmery, bespectacled, spotty girl hovering above the toilet.

"Who the fuck are you?" Draco demanded with a sneer, though he felt his anger giving way to curiosity.

The teenage ghost swooped out of her stall and planted herself directly in front of him. "Oh yes, let's all curse at the dead girl," she said petulantly. "Let's throw things at her head and slam all the doors!"

Anything biting that Draco might have had to say died at her words. He gaped at her for a moment before turning away and leaning his hands on a porcelain washbasin. "This is a boys' bathroom. Go haunt one of the girls' toilets and leave me alone."

He dropped his head and stared into the washbasin, wrapping himself in his frustration, but a second later he jumped backward; a silvery head had popped right through the drain, glaring up at him.

"No," she said, "I'm not going back to any of the girls' toilets. The girls make fun of me, and then they stop using any bathroom I'm in after a while. The prefects don't want me in theirs either."

"I'm a prefect," said Draco, "and I've never heard of you."

"Nooooobody's ever heard of me!" she moaned as she flew over his head and splashed back into her toilet.

"Wait!"

He didn't know why he'd persisted in talking to the sullen ghost, but something had drawn him to her, something he could identify with. And she'd come out, reluctantly, and they'd talked, Draco spending some time asking about who she was and why she was haunting toilets. Then he'd found himself telling her about his assignment, of course leaving out details concerning the Dark Lord and Death Eaters and killing Dumbledore. He'd told and she'd listened, picking at blemishes on her face and regarding him with sympathetic eyes magnified by her thick glasses. Before long he'd felt a lump of defeat in his throat, culminating in tears that had seemed to be ripped from his eyes and which left him exhausted and raw.

He began visiting her with increasing regularity after that, to the point that the emotional venting was the only thing keeping him going, though he was loath to admit it to himself.

Myrtle was her name: Moaning Myrtle. And for good cause, too. She actually appeared to take a sick pleasure in her misery, so much so that Draco wanted to laugh or throttle her or both on several occasions. She listened, though, and praised him. Draco was certainly used to praise, from his sycophantic followers and elitist parents, but Myrtle's praise wasn't the arrogant sort he received from everyone else; it was an encouraging sort, the kind he expected some parents offered their children—if some parents enjoyed praising their children for being miserable, that is. The only thing he'd received from his parents was cold indifference on his father's part and superficial babying on his mother's. It felt strangely calming to hear Myrtle's reassurance that he would be able to figure out his problems and that if he didn't, she would still be willing to associate with him (which involved the offer to share her toilet).

For all Crabbe, Goyle, Pansy, and his mother treated him like a prince, there was something beneath the surface, something he'd only noticed once the true consequences of failure at his task entered into his mind. He'd realized that it had always been there, but it took the serious possibility of being slaughtered on the Dark Lord's orders to see that those who worshipped him did so very conditionally. Whenever he showed any sign of weakness, or even a rare breath of compassion, a coldness could be seen in their eyes—even his own mother had it, though her frigidity was usually overshadowed by disappointment that he wasn't living up to his father's name and a very obvious belief that he didn't have what it took to fulfill his duty to the Dark Lord. He'd become so perceptive to it recently that a chill was nearly tangible in the air around him. That chill, pressing and asphyxiating, was what had ultimately led him to weep his tears to Myrtle.

Scowling, Draco tried to block the stress of the cabinets from his mind so he could concentrate on listening for Filch's footsteps as he walked the last distance to the common room. But the inhospitable stone of the dungeon corridor seemed to mock his newly acquired distaste for coolness, and he was hard-pressed to drag his mind from what awaited him every day in the Room of Requirement.

He sighed in relief when he realized he had arrived at the door, invisibly set in the dank stone, and said the password in his drawling voice. The door materialized before him and swung inward, and Draco schooled his features to his more normal look of bored disdain as he stepped into the dim common room.

The hour was late, and all but a handful of students were already in their dorms, down the lantern-lit hallways that branched out in eight directions as though he were entering the hollowed-out fossil of an enormous spider. The room was long with a low ceiling, and the far corners, though licked by the heat emitted from ornate fireplaces, were quite dark at this time of night, the wall lamps having been extinguished.

In one of the darkest corners, on high-backed, black leather armchairs, sat Crabbe and Goyle, alert to his presence like well-trained yet brainless lapdogs and still sporting some girlish features from their Polyjuice Potion. Blaise was there as well, his long body lazily sprawled across a low settee. He was certainly not there awaiting Draco, but Draco knew he could gain control over the boy if need be. Blaise knew, too, and after the two of them shared a lengthy, even stare, he rose languidly and sauntered off to their dorm room, down the farthest hallway on the north side of the room.

Pansy was there, of course; she always was. She eyed him as she abandoned her armchair for the settee, stretching out across it in much the same fashion Blaise had. Draco sometimes tried to take comfort in the fact that she would wait up until all hours to greet him, but tonight the sight of her was especially unwelcome. He didn't feel like looking into her heartless eyes as she lavished him with insincere accolades. He didn't want any of her other attention, either, the kind that prompted Crabbe and Goyle to stand as he approached and follow down the corridor after Blaise, shooting Draco dumbly enthusiastic looks on the way. Yes, they were happy that Draco would get shagged, and Pansy was proud to shag a rising Death Eater.

Not a word had been spoken yet, though it would take many for Draco to verbalize the hierarchy of the sixth year Slytherins. Crabbe and Goyle simply knew to leave, without so much as a nod from Draco, although typically he had to explain things ad nauseam to the two dolts. Even the most obtuse of creatures could come to recognize patterns and routines, however, and Draco's trysts with Pansy were most certainly routine.

She stared at him now, the fire in her eyes only lit by a desire to be with someone who had the promise of power. She was a Slytherin through and through, perhaps even more so than Draco was. Of late, Draco didn't feel much like one at all; his thirst for power had been replaced with a baser need for survival, and that didn't seem to be what Salazar Slytherin had intended for his House. Still, Draco wasn't one to disrupt the carefully calculated social structure of the elite, and he made his way over to the black settee he'd claimed as his in first year.

"You were out so late tonight, Draco," said Pansy, getting on her knees on the cushion to place her palms on his chest and pout up at him. "Did you miss me?"

Draco grabbed her wrists and pushed her back until she was sitting again. Then he sat next to her. "No." His answer was curt and blasé, but while such an attitude would turn off any normal girl, Pansy became visibly excited by it; she practically glommed onto him and began stroking his hair and sucking on his neck. Straight to the point, she was.

"Don't leave any marks," he ordered. "I'll not have you making me look as cheap as Weasley."

He felt her smile against his skin. Her breathing became heavier and she swung one knee in between his thighs so that she was straddling his leg. When she started grinding against him and moaning into the flesh of his neck, Draco finally reacted: he growled and dragged her closer to him, forcing her to straddle him completely.

"Stop acting like a filthy slag." He twisted his head to pry her lips from his earlobe.

Pansy flashed him a wicked smile as she continued to move against him. At the same time, she slid her feet to the floor, the rest of her body following until she crouched in front of him. Draco knew what was coming next—this entire scene had become something of a nightly ritual—and laid his head back against the leather cushion, eyes closed. "Be gentle this time."

After an annoying amount of unzipping and rearranging, Pansy started lavishing him with attention. Draco relaxed his arms at his sides for as much of her fondling as he could before pulling her back onto the settee. As she resettled next to him, she unbuttoned her blouse to reveal her bare chest—she was always without a bra by the time Draco got back to the common room. She looked at him coyly before propping herself up on all fours and saying, "Like this?"

Draco was impressed that she'd managed to wriggle out of her knickers without him noticing, but he merely said, "No." Tonight it didn't seem appealing.

She looked over her shoulder and pouted again, an unflattering look with her puggish nose, but flipped around to face him, and Draco knew she was expecting to be on top. They were experimental on occasion, but routines and the necessity of being able to dress quickly in case anyone interrupted them led to monotony, and those two positions were by far the most frequent.

"On your back," he ordered, and she obeyed, splaying herself out before him and shooting him sultry, adoring looks. To an observer, it would appear a sexual encounter between two lovebirds, the girl especially besotted with the boy, evident by the way she bit her lip excitedly and cooed for him to come closer.

But that couldn't be more wrong. Pansy was besotted with the idea of him, not who he was. And her ability to look meek and adoring was only that, a look. In reality, she was the one in charge, the one who conducted this nightly ritual, and if the observer got close enough to see her eyes, he would surely change his opinion of what was going on between the "lovebirds."

However, Draco did as was expected of him and climbed over her body. They were never much for foreplay, and even her bare breasts were mostly for show, as she would have become impatient had he tried to pay them any mind.

As it was, his mind was too preoccupied to concentrate on what he was doing. He kept his fast pace up for only a short while, then did something he'd never done before: he slowed down and began planting soft, roaming kisses along Pansy's neck and collarbone, caressing her wherever his hands could reach.

He wasn't sure why he was doing it. He certainly didn't love Pansy or really care if she enjoyed herself, but perhaps it was because he craved something similar. If he stopped and appreciated her body, maybe... maybe she would do the same and not make him feel as though he were only a rung on the social ladder to her. He wasn't sure what he wanted, he just didn't like the sensation that his world was slipping out of his control and no one would be there to pull him up if it did.

Whatever he'd been thinking, he wished he could take it back for the way Pansy's eyes regarded him, cutting into him like icy daggers. A thousand words were conveyed with those eyes, none of them the reassuring ones he sought.

Draco cursed himself a pathetic wanker, then decided against it and cursed Moaning Myrtle instead. She'd done this to him, weakened him to the state he was in; she'd manipulated him into crying and seeking her out repeatedly, to the point that his work was suffering for it. It was her doing.

As swiftly as the tenderness had come, it was gone, replaced by anger and resentment. His kisses at Pansy's neck became bites that had her forcing his head away from his skin. He sneered as he let go, expecting to see her furious for hurting her, but instead she was smiling, a smile that never reached her eyes. It remained there, seemingly plastered on her face, until he was done.

He rolled off her and she slid as far against the back of the settee as possible so there would be room for both of them to lie there. She hadn't even been satisfied, yet she looked more impressed with him than he'd ever seen her. Draco took his wand from the pocket of his half-opened trousers and conjured a blanket large enough to cover them both. Pansy eyed him askance, but said nothing. This was a rare practice as well, lying around after the sex, but Draco didn't want to get up.

"Did you do it yet?" she asked suddenly. Pansy knew he had a task in the Room of Requirement, as did Crabbe and Goyle, of course, but none of them knew exactly what it was.

"Nearly," he lied. He was good at lying; he knew that they key was to sound bored and apathetic about the subject matter, something that came easily for him.

Pansy directed a smug smile at the rough stone ceiling and combed her fingers through her glossy hair. Then she adjusted the blanket over her chest and closed her eyes. Draco turned his head away from her, toward the fire, thoughts racing in his head; when he looked back a few minutes later, she was sleeping soundly. He knew she would have pleasant dreams of being the next Mrs. Malfoy, queen of social circles and envy of any Death Eater's wife. It made Draco ill.

He wished he could fall asleep so peacefully, but he couldn't get more than a few fitful hours at a time lately. Not feeling remotely tired, he stared at Pansy. She could be quite beautiful at times, when she wasn't smirking or making exaggerated expressions. The same observer who would've called them lovebirds would surely say she looked beautiful now, her full pink lips forming a ghost of a smile. The observer might even say she looked like a compassionate girl now that her eyes were closed.

The anger Draco felt earlier ebbed, and he had the same urge to seek comfort in her, amplified by her deceptive docility. Her hand lay on top of the blanket, attracting Draco's attention. He gazed at it for a moment, then after glancing at her face to make sure she was truly asleep, he lifted the hand from its place on her stomach and slowly drew it across his own body and shifted into her embrace, as though she'd fallen asleep holding him.

For a split second, Draco reveled in the fantasy that a living person was soothing him. Then Pansy yanked her hand back, punctuating the rejection by turning on her side, away from him. Even in sleep, Pansy was cold.

Clenching his jaw, Draco flung the blanket off him and rose to sit on the edge of the cushion, elbows resting on his knees and his head clasped between his hands. His mind warred with itself, part of it craving something he'd never had and the other mocking his own weakness. A Malfoy was not supposed to be weak, he was supposed to dominate and gain power. But look where that had landed his father: a sentence in Azkaban and a black mark in the Dark Lord's book. Draco wasn't stupid—he knew that he was being forced to make up for his father's failure.

It was too much. Draco stood in a jerky motion and hastily zipped his trousers. He paced on the dark green mantel rug, the war in his head escalating into a maelstrom until he stopped in his tracks and looked down at his hands; they were shaking, and as he watched, a tear splashed onto his left thumb. Whether it was from anger, frustration, or despair, he couldn't tell. After casting another look at Pansy, the frostiness that emanated from her stabbing at his chest, he walked out of the common room.

He needed to see her. Never mind Filch, and never mind Pansy or anyone else. His carefully controlled life was slipping from his grasp and she was all he could count on to give him what he yearned for. He stumbled through the dark corridors, not bothering to avoid noises, not even paying attention to his surroundings. His feet carried him in the right direction—down endless hallways and up countless flights of stairs—to the second floor bathroom.

By the time he arrived and shut the door behind him, his chest felt as though tight bands were wrapped around it, slowly robbing him of oxygen. He slid down to the tile floor and began to sob into his hands.

After a few painfully long seconds, an icy, familiar breeze surrounded him. It wasn't the repulsive chill that surrounded Pansy and the others, it was something entirely different, welcome and craved.

"I'm so glad you've come to see me," said Myrtle, and she started to cry with him, the sound odd when coming from a person who enjoyed it so much.

Draco couldn't even respond for his sobs, but the feel of her ethereal hands whispering over him, caressing and comforting him, snapped the bands across his chest and he crumpled over to lie on his side, his breath coming in shuddering gasps. There was still a weight pressing on him, but anything was euphoric after what it had been. His wracking sobs stopped, though tears still trickled down his cheeks, and he opened his eyes to gaze up at Myrtle, hovering over him.

He was transfixed. Her eyes, lifeless and cold as they were, held more empathy and heat than any of the others he endured everyday. For a long time he watched her eyes, and to the sounds of Myrtle's tears and the feel of her vaporous hands, Draco fell asleep. His only dreams were of kind, cold eyes watching over him.

The End