Messengers Guild

The Messengers Guild (or Messengers' Guild) is an international professional association with over one thousand members.
 * The Guild was created in large part to ensure fair treatment of messengers. In the past princes employed personal messengers to carry missives and, if the recipient wished to show his disdain for the sender or his message, he would often do so by beheading the messenger.
 * In return the Guild's members pledge to remain politically neutral
 * Guild messengers also take an oath to protect the missives entrusted to them and to keep them confidential
 * Guild messengers have access to skimmers and the guild itself keeps an updated timetable of arrivals and departures of seafaring vessels. All this means that messengers are able to deliver their charge faster than ever
 * Messengers can be identified by their red cloaks. Harming or detaining a guild messenger when he is going about his duties is a punishable offense
 * Inside their cloak messengers have several cylindrical cases for holding scrolls.
 * Messengers often fade into the background and, due in part to their identical dress, outsiders often have difficulty telling messengers apart
 * Princes or other parties may be fined or even blacklisted for mistreatment of guild messengers.
 * Some Guild messengers are based in a particular court but they are formally independent and not to be subjected to the lord's control
 * Standard rates for sending messages between one city and another or sending messages a certain distance are set by the Guild, the situation is slightly different for messengers tied to a court who may receive a steady salary. Either way part of the messenger's earnings are paid to the Guild as dues/commission.
 * The Messengers Guild has offices in major cities (where members can obtain the latest timetables and where messages are sometimes passed off by one messenger to another).
 * The Messengers Guild maintains good relations with the Merchants League.
 * A small number of Guild Messengers are female: the messengers' uniform dress mean they can rarely be distinguished from their male counterparts. This is one of the few ways a woman can travel the seas and highways alone without fear of molestation. The Guild has no official or unofficial stance on women messengers, in part because this is such a new phenomenon and the women themselves do their best to keep their sex a secret.

Example of Messenger's pay:

Message from Eft to New Felix = 220 silver (x2 certified message) + 60 (6 days) + 50 (speedy delivery bonus) = 550 - 30% guild cut = 385 silver total