Cheese
Queso
Cheese was the ratcatcher of the Red Keep during the years of the Dance of the Dragons, the dynastic war fought among the descendants of House Targaryen. His true name was never recorded; the nickname was enough to carry him into the history of the castle he knew better than anyone.
His trade, catching rats through the keep's hidden passages and secret doors, made him exactly the man Mysaria was looking for when she set out to arrange a mission on behalf of Prince Daemon Targaryen, after the death of Lucerys Velaryon.
Chapter 1
The ratcatcher who knew every door
Books and show
Mysaria
Daemon Targaryen
Lucerys VelaryonLong before the Dance, Cheese had already spent years hunting rats through the Red Keep, and the work had taught him the castle's secret passages and hidden doors, a map no guard ever held in full.
His knowledge had one limit: no hidden way led into Maegor's Holdfast except the drawbridge spanning a dry moat lined with iron spikes, which kept the royal chambers out of his reach by that route.
After the death of Prince Lucerys Velaryon, Mysaria, acting as an intermediary for Prince Daemon Targaryen, went looking for a man who could move through the castle unseen, and found exactly that in Cheese.
Chapter 2
The night in the queen's chambers
Books and show
Alicent Hightower
Helaena TargaryenLed by Cheese through a secret passage, a second man known as Blood entered the heart of the castle at his side without crossing a single guard. They climbed to the chamber of Queen Alicent Hightower.
Once inside, Cheese bound and gagged the queen while his companion killed the maid attending her. Then they waited for Queen Helaena to arrive with her three children, as she did every night before putting them to bed.
When Helaena entered the room, the two men forced her to choose which of her children would die. 'An eye for an eye, a son for a son. We want only one, to make things even. The rest of you shall not be touched. Which will you have us take, Your Grace?' Cheese asked her.
Chapter 3
The escape without a trace
Books and show
Aegon II Targaryen
Otto HightowerHelaena named her youngest son, Maelor, reluctantly, but Blood killed Prince Jaehaerys instead, taking the boy's head off with a single blow. The two men fled the castle with the child's head, even though the alarm had already been raised.
Blood was captured two days later. Of Cheese, nothing more was ever heard: no trace, no body, no capture.
King Aegon II Targaryen, beside himself with fury, ordered every ratcatcher in the Red Keep put to death. Ser Otto Hightower replaced the whole trade with a hundred cats brought into the castle.