In the often tedious, dreary world of the shire, the alehouse provides a place to escape for awhile and sit around the circle passing drinks, sharing news, and singing songs. For hen-pecked husbands, the alehouse is also said to be able to provide other...entertainments.

After the old owner Gyrth Tavener was laid to rest last June, the alehouse was taken over by a most unlikely source. Ethelwulf Kildare, the shire’s last Seneschal, purchased the Rowdy as its known for short, from Tavener’s widow, resigned his position as the Crown’s voice in Vanished Wood, and moved in. Two years ago, shortly after replacing Lady Katherine, the Seneschal Ethelwulf developed a rather acute case of gout, for which the physicians recommended treatment with small doses of mercury. The treatment was not entirely a success. Lord Ethelwulf’s gout faded, but he came down with an awful brain fever, which left him erratic, manic, and occasionally filled with strange thoughts that left his neighbors both puzzled, and frightened (such as the belief that there is a "High King" living far to the south, in the land of Trimaris, who has been enchanted to appear as a six-foot tall rat.).

Since then, Ethelwulf (or "Wulfie" as he now periodically calls himself), tends to matters at the alehouse, brewing ales and vinting wines while his lady wife, Arwyn, tends to whatever misadventures the new tavener’s curious mind leads them too. Still, the alehouse keeps running, and while many suspect that it is Lady Arwyn who tends the ledgers and manages the help, none would heap more shame upon that well-born lady by speaking of it in public.