Arya/Gendry Modern!AU
Summary:

Arya had never wanted to come to King's Landing when her father, Ned Stark, had been appointed as Prime Minister. Now she needs to get out, as soon as possible. King Robert Baratheon is dead, and his son had her father arrested for having a suspected hand in the King's death. So she cuts her hair, lies about her age and gender, and with a new friend tries to get to a bus that'll take her north—and home. If she can keep her secret until the bus gets to the army training academy known as The Wall, she can meet up with her cousin, a soldier named Jon Snow, and go back to Winterfell.

Gendry Waters is an orphan, but at age 21 it doesn't matter much. He planned to work as an apprentice to Tobho Mott, the best luthier in King's Landing, until he was old enough to take over for the aging man, but life takes a wild detour when he meets an odd girl in a cab. Less than a month after a visit from the Prime Minister, Gendry and his new friend are on the run. Tobho tells him to flee, and fast, without so much as an explanation. He hopes to find himself a passenger on the long black bus headed to The Wall, along with an angry, scrawny little boy called Harry who has something to hide.

Gendry left the pub only slightly buzzed, tired of being sloppily hit on by drunk young women teetering dangerously in their high heels. It was shaping up to be one of those nights where he had more fun drinking alone, anyways. He hailed a cab, and was surprised to see a sullen girl already in the back seat. Well, he corrected himself, maybe 'girl' isn't the right word. Too young for the clubs, probably, but not a child. "Taurus Lane Apartments," he said to the cabbie.

"Way down in Flea Bottom, eh?" the grizzled man behind the wheel asked caustically over the music pounding from an adjacent club. "Not the nicest part o' town, but you look like you can defend yourself."

Gendry cringed, thankful for the dark that hid his blush. He had no shortage of pride, but he did have a shortage of things to be proud of. At the cabbie's comment, the girl next to him finally turned from the window and eyed him with a frown. She wasn't pretty, really: her wide grey eyes were heavy with smudged dark makeup and too large for her narrow face, which was framed on either side by nice but shapeless dark hair. Still, there was something fierce in that plain face. "Hello," he said tentatively, "'M Gendry."

She frowned at him. "Cat." It was more a statement than a response, and she turned her head back towards the flow of young life coming in and out of all of the clubs on the street.

He nodded. "Nice to meet you then, Cat. You, uh, you look a bit young to be out so la—"

"I'm 19!" she said hotly, without turning back.

"Okay! Sorry, I was just making sure you weren't in some kind of trouble or something." He didn't believe she was 19; 16 seemed more likely.

"Where was it for you, lass?" the cabbie asked her.

"Take me anywhere, I don't care. I have $11, so I guess take me $11 away from this spot."

Gendry eyed her curiously. He'd spent enough of his money taking cabs home from the pubs to know that her few dollars was basically enough to get her dropped at his doorstep and not much else. As they drove through a darkened underpass, he thought of asking her if she lived in Flea Bottom, but an irrational niggling fear held him back. What're you afraid of? he berated himself, This girl weighs seven stone soaking wet! He endured a few more minutes of silence. When he couldn't take it any longer, he bit his lip before speaking cautiously. "Cat? I dunno if you're from around here or not...Flea Bottom can be a rough place. Do you live there? Listen, wherever you live I'd be glad to take you there, or give you more cab money...I'd hate for you to be stranded in that part of town." Gendry hoped to the gods above that he didn't sound creepy or weird. A girl her size would get torn up in his neighborhood, and he was genuinely worried for her.

Her response was halting and hesitant. "I'll be fine," she said evenly, "...but thanks, I guess." She turned her lamp-like eyes up at him and something in his chest twinged without reason.

"You look familiar," he said, trying to figure out where he knew her from. "Have I seen you before? Around the shop, maybe? I work at Mott's Music," he added for clarification.

Cat shook her head slowly, eyes wide.

"No, sorry. I'm not—I haven't been in King's Landing for long," she explained cautiously.

Gendry sighed, his building coming into view. "Then I'm definitely not letting you wander about Flea Bottom at midnight. Come on!" he said, placing enough fare for the both of them in the dish by the cabbie's side. He opened the door and stepped out in front of his apartment, waiting for her to follow.

Cat bit her lip and looked around the dark, empty street before sliding out of the cab as well. "You didn't have to pay for me," she grumbled, eyes fixed on the sidewalk.

"No, I didn't," he agreed. "But if you're stupid enough to go wandering around the ghetto at all hours of the night when you're new to town, I'm not going to rob you of money you'll need for some other cab that could save your life. Where do you live?"

"How do I know I can trust you?" she asked warily, crossing her thin arms.

Gendry threw up his arms. "Finally thinking, are you?" He shook his head and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Listen, if it makes you more comfortable, I'll just walk you to the block, if you promise not to get yourself killed between there and your front door, alright?"

Her slim face screwed up in anger. "I didn't ask for your help, stupid! What d'you think this is, the Middle Ages? Am I some bloody damsel you need to save from distress? 'Cause if that's what this is you can bloody well fuck off, because I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself without a knight to save me!"

He took a step back, visibly thrown off by her explosion. After a moment, he regained his composure and spoke calmly. "That's definitely not what this is. I'm just trying to make sure you get home alright, okay? I know you're new here but things are really dangerous in King's Landing right now...The old Prime Minister just died and hardly anyone knows who the new one is," she huffed, for some reason, "the King is a useless fat bastard, crime has been off the charts the last few months and the police don't seem to care. Nobody seems to care. I've lived in Flea Bottom my whole life and this is the worst I've seen things. Please let me help you get home," he finished, nearly begging.

Cat chewed her lip, picking at a frayed thread on the sleeve of her large sweatshirt. "Fine," she said in a small voice. "I live by the Red Keep."

He cocked his head to the side, looking her up and down and wondering what business a girl wearing a faded sweatshirt, a denim skirt, and cut up dark tights leading into grey Converse trainers had living by the palace. "Where are you from, Cat?"

"Braavos," she responded quickly, but Gendry didn't believe her. She was too light, her accent was wrong—the North was more likely.

"Right, and I'm the King's son," he said sarcastically. She was probably a favorite maid of one of the Prime Minister's daughters that had come south with him. "Come on," he said, walking east, "Palace is this way."

She followed reluctantly, trailing him until he grabbed her arm and pulled her even to him. A small drizzle began to fall, but neither of them seemed to care. "Did you say you worked at a music store?" she asked after a few minutes.

He nodded. "Mott's. He's the best luthier in King's Landing, and probably in all of Westeros."

Cat nodded thoughtfully. "What do you do? D'you just sell stuff?

"I used to," Gendry explained, "but now I do as much of the making as he does. He's getting old, y'see, and he won't admit he's got arthritis, the poor bloke."

"My uncle Benjen brought me a guitar one time," she mused, not directly in response to him. "Well—sort of a guitar. An eastern-type guitar. He's in the army."

Gendry didn't bother to point out that she'd just blown her lie about being from Braavos. "If it was sort of Hershey's Kiss shaped with a long neck and a ton of pegs on the side, it was a sitar. If it was that shape but with only a few pegs, it was probably a tambura," he imparted, looking around the street for thugs. The rain picked up, but there was nothing he could do about that.

"Tambura, that's it," Cat agreed. "Made really queer noises, drove Sa—my sister mad," she smiled, looking at him. "I've always wanted a true guitar, though, an electric one," she remarked.

Gendry noticed that the faded letters on her sweatshirt spelled some old band's name. He chuckled. "What d'you listen to?"

"Weird stuff, mostly," she answered, no longer bothering to hide her Northern accent. "The Cure, anything Jack White does, The Modern Lovers," she listed, pointing to the faded heart logo on her sweatshirt, "The Smiths and The Stone Roses, sometimes, and a bunch of old classic stuff."

He nodded, respectful of her taste, and opened his mouth to suggest some other bands. Before he got a chance, though, he saw two sketchy-looking blokes about his age round the corner in front of him. Thinking quickly, he pulled Cat into an alley. "I'm sorry," he whispered, "you have to trust me and you have to play along, alright?"

Steely eyes wide with fear, she bobbed her head in uncertain acknowledgement.

"I'm really sorry about this," he repeated as the sound of steps grew louder. When it sounded like the men were close, he leaned her against the brick alley wall and crashed his rain-soaked lips onto hers.

She resisted at first, but soon gave into his heated snog. It sounded like the men were passing...

The footsteps stopped. "Wot 'ave we 'ere?" a cruel voice growled.

Gendry pulled away from Cat's lips. "Just me and my girl," he said confidently, hoping the thugs didn't notice her bristle at being called his 'girl,' "You lot got a problem with that?"

Lightning cracked in the distance and the cruel voice spoke again, coming from the smaller of the two men. They seemed to be about Gendry's age, maybe a bit younger. "As a matter o' fact we do, mate," he adjusted the ridiculous old-fashioned bowler hat he was wearing. "Y'see, me an' Squeak 'ere like to 'ave us a taste of all the pretty young lasses on this block, an' we ain't never met thissun, so if you could be so kind as t' pass 'er over—"

Gendry's fist slammed into his teeth before he could finish his foul sentence. It knocked the thug to the ground, but his huge friend Squeak was more than ready to take on Gendry. He ducked a clumsy punch and delivered his own to Squeak's throat, which didn't deter the large man in the slightest.

As Gendry occupied himself with Squeak, the smaller foe slowly rose again and moved towards Cat. Unflinchingly, she delivered a solid kick to his guts that sent him back to the ground, and another to his genitals once he landed in a dirty puddle.

Squeak's jaw gave a sickening crunch as Gendry rammed his head into it. The two men subdued, Gendry grabbed Cat's wrist and ran with her, profusely apologizing for both kissing her and leaving her vulnerable in the fight.

Once they were a safe distance away, Cat stopped him "Will you shut up? Snogging me there probably saved my life, and I knocked that bastard down better than you did." It was absolutely pouring now, and thunder rumbled through the dark night.

"Nicely done, that was," he conceded, grateful that they were getting close to the palace. Hands deep in his pockets, he avoided meeting her eyes. Faked or not, it had been a nice snog. "You should...you should bring that tambura down to Mott's sometime, it probably needs serviced. I can teach you to tune it and whatever," he offered, trying not to sound like he was using the fact that he'd saved her from assault as a springboard to ask her out.

She stopped at the edge of Visenya Park, under a street lamp. "Maybe," she answered unconvincingly, "but I'm hoping I won't be stuck here too long." Their eyes met, and she went silent for a moment before looking over her shoulder. "Anyways, I can make it from here. Thanks, though," she added warmly.

"Nah, don't thank me. I wouldn't have felt right leaving you on the street."

Cat nodded, not really listening. "So long, then..."

Before Gendry could register what was happening, Cat leaned up and forward and planted a small, unsure kiss on his lips. She turned and nearly ran through the park and towards the Red Keep, leaving him quite gobsmacked.

Gendry had been careful to avoid the street of their altercation on his way home. His heart was pounding with adrenaline—from the kiss, the fight, and the other kiss—and he walked quickly back to Taurus Lane. There were millions of people in King's Landing, and he'd probably never see her again, but shit. He felt all queer inside, like he'd not gotten enough sleep or been drugged or something. Shaking his head to clear his mind, he went up the steps to his apartment and turned the key. What he really needed was a stiff drink.

Locking all three of the locks on his door behind him (one could never be too careful in this neighborhood), he kicked off his boots and shed his wet jumper, throwing it on the small sofa. He grabbed the remote from the coffee table and flicked on the television to watch the news before stepping into his tidy, cramped kitchen. The news was just silly feature stories about the royal family and whatnot, the sort of filler that came before the hard stories. As he opened his cabinet for scotch and a tumbler, he heard the Dornish anchor drawl on about the Prime Minister's family putting down one of their dogs after it bit Prince Joffrey. Gendry snorted, looking to the television in the hopes of footage of the spoiled prince being bitten. Instead of footage, there was a picture of the Minister's five children. The picture zoomed slowly in on the youngest daughter as the anchor spoke. "Minister Stark's youngest daughter Arya was the owner of the offending dog, who seems to have..."

Gendry didn't hear the rest on account of the boom of thunder that came from outside. He didn't have to hear it, really. "Cat from Braavos my bleeding arse," he moaned out loud. "I snogged the Prime fucking Minister's daughter!" Taking a deep breath, he put the glass tumbler away and replaced it with a large plastic cup, pouring an unhealthy amount of scotch into it. He took a lengthy quaff, topped the cup off, and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Fucking idiot," he snapped at himself, "that family's been all over the goddamned news, no shitting wonder you recognized her!" He shut the cabinet, banged his head against it a few times, and drank more, practically waiting for the Royal Guard to beat down his door and arrest him.