Well, I kind of turned Jowan in with my first character, something which I still regret...guilty, guilty, guilty! It's why he's still such an important figure in the game for me.
I can easily see Beth and Ashya being paired together. Ashya would hardly have been the model student, but there would have been no malice in her heart prior to the Harrowing, so while she'd have found Beth a strange girl - "All those books! How can they possibly be more interesting than all the people around you?" - this would have only made her intrigued and give her an incentive to try to understand how Beth thought.
Of course no amount of positive influence was going to quiet her down so...I can imagine Beth growing exasperated (especially when Ashya thought it funny to hide her books) and occasionally having to dress her down. On the other hand Ashya is a person who gets easily attached so she will have grown to like Beth and regard her as a mixture of friend and mentor. Not necessarily making her obedient, however ;)
If the fact that she turned in a best friend to the First Enchanter is common knowledge though, I suspect that her feelings about Beth will be quite mixed now, unable to relax in her presence in case she let something slip.