The Animal Shelter

The animal shelter built and owned by Lance Blackthorn. It is located on a plot of land roughly a hectare large that used to house a mansion near the Hill, now mostly torn down to make room for animals to roam in the backyard. Generally takes in any of Bete Noire's many strays and gives them out for adoption. It also offers treatment to anyone with non-human physiology (mostly werewolves), and is almost completely reliant upon natural remedies. (Of course, the natural remedies are from Lance's world, which make them near-magical in effectiveness.)

As of Sunday 17 July 2011, the shelter has been warded with an anti-teleportation spell, aside from a very specific area under a tree next to the spring where the hydra lives. She has been trained and won't attack people she knows are safe, but have fun dodging those five heads, teleporting intruders. The entire property has also been blanketed with a non-violence spell which affects all self-aware beings. The spell ends a couple of feet from the shelter wall (which means no violence to make the walls come down) and covers the area higher than the turret as well as the safehouse underneath, including a few feet beyond the sewer entrance. Basically it just stops beings from committing a violent act with a bit of a stunning magical rebound if they try. (This spell does work on Dragonair but, interestingly enough, doesn't work on Aerodactyl. Nor does it work on Kelp.)

Employees
Owner: Lance Blackthorn Staff: Cho Takahashi, David Posner Volunteers: Wesley Wyndam-Pryce, Tyki Mikk

Residents

 * Lance and his dragons, Aerodactyl and Dragonair (plus the hydra, Kelp)
 * Cho Takahashi (in the clinic side)

Layout
Note: the shelter's dimensions are larger than usual, the place clearly built for something larger than a human to move through. The apartment entrance is kept locked at almost all times, but the clinic and stairs leading up are unregulated. The exam room, Lance's office and the indoor kennels are kept locked at night, however.



There is no button indicating the elevator can go down, but it leads to the safehouse underneath. Alternatively, there's a stairwell leading up inside a corner of the 'storeroom' on the clinic side. The safehouse is divided into small hollows, like bedrooms, with a kitchen and bathroom near the stairs and another bathroom on the far side. The boiler-room and pumps for the artificial spring are in separate rooms, only open to the staff, to the left. On the right side of the stairs there's a hidden door leading into the sewer and another hidden door which leads to The Creature's room.

Services

 * General medical attention, especially minor wounds, for animals and 'supernaturals'
 * Adopting out animals
 * Animal training (primarily dogs and dragons, but others too)
 * Housing animals such as dragons or horses and recently a hippogriff
 * Specialised leatherworking (ie, making tack for dragons)
 * Occasional sale of natural medicines including: tea-leaves which alleviate migraines; salve which heals burns; oil to ease muscle-aches; anti-nausea powder; natural antiseptic cream
 * One or two safe rooms for the violent; eg, an out-of-control vampire
 * Safehouse for witnesses, refugees, etc
 * Sale of fresh fish. Yep.

Policies

 * The shelter is a neutral zone. Anyone is welcome for medical attention, though Lance reserves the right to kick someone out if necessary
 * There is no smoking inside; only on the roof or on the street, essentially
 * The apartment is an invite-only zone. The greenhouse, stables and kennels are staff-only unless accompanied
 * The sewer entrance and safehouse are not playgrounds.