Red Wolf House

The Red Wolf House is an inn located in the West Quarter of Obsidian City on Tiger's Eye Street. It is one of the oldest public houses in Aphelia and one of the most well-known.

Purpose / Function

The Red Wolf House provides rooms to customers. These rooms come in several designs for groups of different sizes. Different types of bedding meant for different species are also available. Rooms are rented by the night. Renting a room also grants patrons access to the House's baths. Chargers for Slates can be requested. Reservations can be made in advance but must be made in person.
The Red Wolf's dining room is open at all hours to patrons and non-patrons alike. In fact, visitors do not need to buy anything to be in the dining room and may stay as long as they like so long as they don't cause any trouble, so those with no money and nowhere else to go can stay there for the warmth. Visitors are expected to share any room available at their table with others and may be asked to give up their spot at the bar if they've been there for hours without drinking anything.
The exact menu available in the dining room changes from night to night and be seen on the chalkboard above the bar. Soup is always available, usually made from mushrooms along with whatever vegetables are available from the greenhouses, though the chefs will make meat soups whenever they can. Other usual food items include crab balls, croquettes, fried fish, potato bread, and various pickled vegetables. The kitchen does not make its own baked goods but may sell those purchased from the bakery across the street. The House's most famous alcoholic beverage is the spiked cold root tea, but mead, vodka and vodka cocktails, nonalcoholic root tea and sweetened water are also available. 
The dining room also houses a stage that is frequented by local and traveling musicians, dancers, storytellers, and actors, with shows almost every night. There will usually be two performances a night, one during breakfast and one during supper; how late they run is both at the discretion of the performers and how much the House is willing to pay them. Who is preforming on a given night can be found on the chalkboard above the bar as well as the one outside the House's main door. When there is not live (or at least animate) entertainment, the staff will keep the radio on, providing music and warnings about local dangers.

Alterations

As the building has been in use for centuries, numerous repairs have been made over the years, including replacing the pre-Nightfall wooden supports as they rotted away. About a hundred years ago, the Red Wolf House took over the storage building next to it and repurposed it as additional housing, with walls knocked down to connect it to the original building.

Architecture

The sign hung above the door, depicting a scarlet canine, identifies the Red Wolf House from the street (as with many businesses in Aphelia, the sign uses a picture rather than words for people who can't read Aphelian). The building and rooms are rectangular and constructed out of the same polished near-black stone as everything around them, though the roof had to be replaced not that long ago with new, dark red tiles. The floor of the second floor is made of heavily preserved wood now reinforced with metal beneath, though all the previously wooden supports throughout the building have been replaced with metal. All the floors are covered with rugs and the walls are hung with curtains to keep in the heat. All heating and light in the inn is provided with crystal. The baths and washrooms, located on the first floor, as well as the kitchen, all have indoor plumbing.

History

The building that is now the Red Wolf House started as one of the many structures built out of rubble from the fortress after the Nightfall, as the worsening climate and growing Faceless attacks drove more and more refugees into Obsidian. While meant as public temporary housing, it eventually became the home of two families, one human and one Voiced wolves with unusually red coats, which gave the place its name. These two families furnished the structure as best they could and offered others a place of comfort to sleep in exchange for whatever supplies they could provide (though, given the state the land was in at the time, they would often let others stay for virtually nothing). The building passed on through their descendants, however indirect, and as Aphelia stabilized and developed a cash economy, it became a formal business, though the tradition of letting anyone stay in the dining hall remained.

Tourism

Most of the people staying in the Red Wolf Inn's rooms are travelers from outside Obsidian City, though there are a few Obsidianites who've moved in for long stretches of time. Many Obsidianites come to the dining room for food, drinks, and entertainment.

Type

Inn