Provides food and lodging in castles (5)
I believe the answer is:
keeps
'lodging in castles' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both man-made objects as well as being plural nouns.
Maybe there's a link between them I don't understand?
'provides food' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'food' could be 'e' (E is an example) and 'e' is found within the answer.
The remaining letters 'keps' is a valid word which might be clued in a way I don't understand.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).
'and' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for keeps that I've seen before include "Retains" , "Stores" .)