A/N: Hello everyone, may you be regular readers of mine or not at all! Sooo...recently (as in, during season 7 of Game of Thrones), I've found myself falling head over heels for Beric Dondarrion, a character that doesn't even have his own tag around here, see how discriminated he is!

Anyway, this is a silly modern AU I started right after season 7 and basically wrote the entire plot to waaaay before I wrote my other Beric/Ashara fic, The Cub and the Lightning Lord. If you are more of a purist, you may want to read that instead of this. This is pure crack. This is hormone-driven and I'm not even sorry.

Anyway, you'll enjoy it I'm sure, please tell me what you make of it and happy reading!

Disclaimer: I do not own any of Game of Thrones' characters. I only own my OC Ashara Mormont and the plot surrounding her in the modern world.

1. Charity work

The party was buzzing with people from all around town. From all around the country actually. Ashara could see a couple who were definitely ailing from the Mediterranean – maybe from Dorne, the former English colony. Their luscious brown hair and tanned skin left little to imagination when concerning their origins.

Although – she thought as she caught sight of another kind of brown hair and tanned skin – there were also Dothrakis from the Middle-East, the men with their long braids and the women with their short and lithe statures. They looked like fishes out of water.

To be perfectly honest, Ashara did not really understand what she was doing there. Granted, it was a charity held for the people who had been impacted by the vicious terrorist attacks in the North, those perpetrated by the zealots known as Army of the Dead. They basically preached the End of the World, and their leader, the so-called 'Night King', had taken to burning down villages and killing innocents to prove a point.

So Daenerys Targaryen, who was coincidentally running for Prime Minister, had decided to host a charity event, and everyone from everywhere who had even the smallest link to her had been invited.

Which meant Ashara's father, Jorah Mormont, who was Daenerys' closest advisor next to Tyrion Lannister, brother to current Prime Minister menace Cersei Lannister.

Jorah was currently dancing with Dany's bestfriend Missandei, who was wearing a deep blue dress that showed her coffee skin-tone and wonderful hair. Ash sighed, instantly jealous. And she liked the lass.

She was planted next to the bar, and sipped on her third glass of champagne absent-mindedly. She shouldn't have been there. Those things she always avoided. She hated crowds, and even more than that: she hated crowds made of hypocrites and rich people.

And yes, even when that included her father.

Ashara took a fag out of her purse and placed it to her lips. She needed a smoke. Even though she had been trying to stop for weeks by then, this was too much. She needed the oblivion the nicotine would provide.

"Ttttttt," came a deep voice she knew all-too-well, "you are not allowed to do that in here." A gloved hand picked the cigarette from her lips and she saw Davos Seaworth chuck it through the room.

She rolled her eyes. "I should have known you'd be there… Where's your infuriating boss?"

He chuckled. "It's good to see you too, Ash. And to answer your delightful question, Jon is currently introducing his sister to Daenerys."

Ash peaked from around him and effectively saw a mop of brown locks close to the silver of Dany's. Next to him, despite what she'd have thought, wasn't Sansa Stark, but a smaller form with the same mop of brown hair. "Arya's come home?"

Davos nodded with a sigh. "Yup. And believe me when I say that cleaning after that one is not easy."

She snorted. "You're the butler, not the maid." He needn't answer, so she carried on. "Thought she was dating that boy you adopted. Gendry."

"She is. And I did not adopt Gendry."

Ashara chuckled. "Come on, Davos, you and I both know that you have a tendency to consider each straying child your own. First me, then Gendry, and now Jon. We're all your kids in your eyes, admit it."

He looked down at her with that smirk of his. "I never liked you."

Ashara grinned, then looked him up and down. "You look smart, by the way." He had donned a tweed grey jacket over grey cotton trousers, and a light shirt underneath. The perfect butler indeed.

He smiled. "You're not too bad either."

She rolled her eyes. "Papa almost forced me to wear a dress. I didn't know why he wanted me here so badly and almost came wearing my day-to-day comfy jeans. Until I managed to get it out of him that he wanted me to meet someone."

"Oh?" Davos' smirk was too cheeky, she had to counter it.

"Not like that!" She narrowed her grey eyes at him. "At least I hope so. He said it was for business. Hopes to find me a job." She rolled her eyes. "And he thought me wearing a dress would show how much of a social worker I am. Idiot."

Davos didn't counter her words, seemingly approving her choice of dungarees over a black crop-top, and simple black high-heels that were so old and worn-out that she felt as comfortable in them as she did in slippers. Her tattoo of a cub was on full display on her right biceps, and the scar she bore on the left side of her stomach showed a bit, but she was used to people looking at her as if she was a strange object of curiosity, and didn't mind anymore.

"Hey Potato-Face."

Ashara turned to see Jon Snow approach her. Anyone else wouldn't have realised it had been him to speak, since the usual pout was on his face, but Ash knew him better than most, and soon, a smile broke on the stern lad's face. "You're hideous," she said before sipping on yet another glass of champagne.

He wasn't, to be honest. The tuxedo and bowtie he had donned were perfect if he wanted to impress his current crush – Daenerys – and if the silver-haired beauty's moon eyes at him were any indication, his choice of clothes was definitely appealing to her.

"Dance?" he asked simply with a hand outstretched.

More people than before were swaying on the dance-floor, including Jon's bodyguards – who were also married, as it happens – Tormund and Brienne. The both of them were dancing their waltz so enthusiastically that most people were making way for their giant statures. Ash loved those two to bits. They were hilarious together.

Anyway, she placed her glass in Davos' ready hand, and followed her old friend into the fray.

"I'm gonna walk on your feet so many times you won't be able to walk," she whispered.

"Shut it or I dip you and drop you."

She chuckled. They had always had those interactions, ever since they had met three years prior. It had been a coincidence, she'd been looking for a social job and he'd been applying for the same – strangely enough, in Dragonstone, Daenerys' first business in England – and they had been friends ever since.

She had his back, he had hers. They didn't need words, they had trust.

And besides, Ashara was five years older than Jon, and to her, it was not a bridge she'd cross. Ugh. No way.

"So, dear old Dad managed to make your ass come here?"

Ashara snorted again, her hand and head leaning on his shoulder. "Said he wanted me to meet someone for a job."

"Oh? Must be that guy Dany's invited. A big ponte for charity work, apparently."

"Oh?" she mirrored, leaning back a bit so she'd meet his dark eyes. "Do you know the name?"

"Don't think she mentioned, but I know the association he's created. And so do you." He smirked. "You've been trying to get in for ages."

"The Brotherhood without Banners?" Ashara's grey eyes had turned wide and disbelieving. "Beric Dondarrion is coming here tonight?"

Jon shrugged. "Guess so if that's the name of the guy. So, are you going to try and charm him? Cause we both know you're not that charming at all…"

She gently shoved him off her with a smile. "Shut up."

But her mind was buzzing with thoughts.

The Brotherhood without Banners. She'd dreamt her whole life – okay, perhaps not true – to work for and with them, and now their boss, the great, the famous Beric Dondarrion, was going to be a breath away from her.

She would need to thank her Papa later…for once.