Cersei Lannister

She was born at Casterly Rock in 266, the first child of Tywin and Joanna Lannister, minutes before her twin Jaime, who came out holding her foot; Aerys II sent them each their weight in gold. As children they were inseparable, playing among the caged lions their grandfather Tytos had once kept, and sharing a bed, which is where their first encounters began; when a servant caught them and told their mother, their rooms were moved to opposite ends of the castle. Joanna died giving birth to Tyrion, and Cersei blamed the newborn from the start; when the Princess of Dorne visited with Elia and Oberyn, she tried to hurt Tyrion and Jaime stopped her in time.

The princess proposed marrying her to Oberyn, but Tywin already had Prince Rhaegar in mind and turned the offer down; he told her of the plan when she was six, and she didn't meet Rhaegar until she was ten, at a tourney her father hosted at Lannisport, where she fell for him. Years later, when Jaime arrived in King's Landing freshly knighted, Cersei pushed him toward the Kingsguard so he'd stay unmarried and close to her; Aerys took his vow, and an enraged Tywin resigned as Hand and split the twins apart once more, taking Cersei back to Casterly Rock.

Before her betrothal to Rhaegar was even announced, a woodswitch called Maggy the Frog gave her a prophecy that has followed her since childhood. Maggy told her a friend from her youth would die, that her love for Rhaegar would go unanswered, and that she would marry King Robert in a union marked by infidelity on both sides. She also said Cersei's three children would wear crowns and all die soon after, that everything she loved would be taken from her by a younger, more beautiful queen, and that her valonqar — the little brother, in High Valyrian — would strangle her.

The tourney at Lannisport, where Cersei had hoped to see her betrothal to Rhaegar sealed, ended without any match — Aerys II refused it. Ever since, she has assumed Tyrion is the valonqar from the prophecy, and suspects Margaery Tyrell may be the younger, more beautiful queen meant to take everything from her.

Once the war that put the Baratheons on the throne was over, her marriage to King Robert was arranged to seal the alliance with House Lannister; they wed in 284 and Cersei became queen of the Seven Kingdoms. The marriage cooled fast, and she took up again with Jaime, whose affair produced her three children, Joffrey, Myrcella, and Tommen — Robert was present at none of the births. The princes' complete lack of resemblance to the king raised Lord Stannis Baratheon's suspicions, which he brought to the Hand of the King, Jon Arryn; shortly after the tourney for Joffrey's name day, Arryn fell ill and died before he could act, and Stannis, convinced Cersei was to blame though she was innocent, fled to Dragonstone.

When Robert traveled to Winterfell after Jon Arryn's death, Cersei went with him; during a hunt, she and Jaime stayed behind alone, Bran Stark caught them together, and Jaime pushed him from a tower so he couldn't tell. On the road back to the capital, Joffrey was hurt because of Arya Stark and her direwolf; Cersei demanded the girl's hand be cut off, but Robert refused.

After Tyrion was arrested, Cersei argued with Robert and he struck her in front of Eddard Stark, the new Hand of the King. Eddard already knew, from his own inquiry into Jon Arryn's death, the truth about the princes' parentage; he confronted her and she didn't deny it. She tried and failed to seduce him, and out of pity for innocent children he gave her time to flee. Cersei's answer was that in the game of thrones you win or you die.

She used that time to have her cousin Lancel keep Robert drinking before a hunt, until he was too drunk to dodge the boar that killed him. The next morning she seized power, put Joffrey on the throne despite claims of bastardy, had Eddard arrested, and declared herself Queen Regent; Joffrey, once king, listened to no one and had him executed on his own order.

Tywin sent Tyrion to stand in as Hand and rein in the edicts Cersei and Joffrey kept passing; she nearly had him jailed, until he promised Jaime's freedom, and from then on he undid nearly every order she gave. With Jaime gone, Cersei took other lovers — her cousin Lancel, the Kettleblack brothers — and saw Myrcella off at the docks, bound for Dorne as Doran Martell's ward and betrothed to his son Trystane.

As Stannis closed in on the capital, she tried to smuggle Tommen out to Rosby, but Tyrion intercepted the convoy; furious, she took hostage a prostitute she believed was Jaime's lover. On the day of the Battle of the Blackwater she threw a feast to keep the court ladies' minds off the fighting; when the Mud Gate looked about to fall, she had Joffrey brought back to the castle, which caused desertions and nearly lost the city — only Tywin and Mace Tyrell arriving with reinforcements saved it.

Tywin looked to remarry her off, and after weighing several candidates settled on Willas Tyrell; Cersei refused, so did Mace Tyrell, and the plan died. When Joffrey was poisoned at his wedding to Margaery, she accused Tyrion and Sansa Stark, and named Gregor Clegane her champion; she tried to buy Oberyn Martell's vote with a hint of marriage, but he chose to fight for Tyrion to avenge his sister Elia and died in the fight. Tywin wanted her sent to Casterly Rock; she refused to be anything less than Queen Regent, and Jaime also refused to leave the Kingsguard to help her.

After Tywin died at Tyrion's hand, she offered the Handship to Jaime and to Kevan; both refused her terms, so she named Harys Swyft, which also gave her leverage over Kevan, his son-in-law. She took the regency for Tommen, who — unlike Joffrey — obeyed her in everything, and reluctantly accepted his marriage to Margaery Tyrell, though she vented her frustration by burning down the Tower of the Hand with wildfire; she placed Lady Taena Merryweather as a spy in the young queen's court and promised a lordship for Tyrion's head.

Her paranoia drove Jaime away. She stopped paying the Faith and the Iron Bank to fund a fleet, which led the Faith to refuse to anoint Tommen; the new High Sparrow talked her into restoring the Faith's military orders in exchange for crowning him and forgiving the debt, and the Bank cut off loans across Westeros. With that same unpaid money she raised a fleet under Aurane Waters, and when ironborn raiders struck the Sword Islands, she refused to lift the sieges of Storm's End and Dragonstone; Loras Tyrell took the latter, but was wounded doing it.

She talked Osney Kettleblack into sleeping with Margaery and going to the Wall to kill Jon Snow, but instead had him confess to the High Sparrow, and Margaery was locked in the Great Sept; the Septon took Cersei to see Osney, who under torture confessed he had slept with her instead, and that he had killed the previous High Septon on her orders. She tried to flee and ended up in a cell; days later Qyburn told her the Faith would try her for murder, treason, and adultery, and carried her plea for help to Jaime at Riverrun, which he never answered.

Cersei was still the Faith's prisoner, unlike Margaery, who had been rescued by one of her father's bannermen, Lord Randyll Tarly. She confessed to the High Sparrow that she had slept with her cousin Lancel and all three Kettleblacks, sins that wouldn't cost her life, and kept denying the rest; in exchange for one visit a day, she learned Myrcella had been hurt and Arys Oakheart had died, leaving a Kingsguard vacancy, and sent word to Qyburn that the time had come.

Before her trial, the Faith made her walk in atonement from the Great Sept to the Red Keep: they shaved her and stripped her naked, and an escort of Warrior's Sons, Poor Fellows, and septas shielded her from the crowd. She broke down crying near the end, and a huge, silent knight in white enameled armor, visor down, carried her the rest of the way — Ser Robert Strong, Qyburn told her, the Kingsguard's newest member and her new champion.

That night she dined with her uncle Kevan, who would be dead within hours, and asked him to let Lady Taena back at court once her innocence was proven. When Kevan said there was no word of Jaime, Cersei didn't seem troubled — if he were dead, she said, she would know.