Scribes

The Scribe Guild is one of the world-wide guilds. Many guilds have connections to the others, but are organized at the country or the regional level. The Scribes have a central organization, located in Sartor.

Scribes are writers. They are also artists, diplomats, spies, couriers, archivists, librarians, and postal people when necessary. They are known to outsiders simply as Scribes, and they often wear formal robes if required.

Inside the guild the organization has a number of levels, with training ranging from the basic ten years of apprenticeship and two to five years at the 'journey' level. The higher levels require more training, and the selection process is exceedingly rigorous.

At the basic level, Scribes need to have excellent handwriting, and to be patient and discreet. At the top level, Scribes have ruled kingdoms in all but name. The top level Scribes are usually forbidden to marry for the duration of their term, as that creates the possibility of partisanship and indiscretion.

Scribes can be affiliated with more than one guild, such as Painters, Mages, Couriers, etc.

In the more modern times, when communication between kingdoms is better than it's been for centuries, several far-sighted individuals have observed that the world belongs to the scribes. They are everywhere, pens busy, ears listening, but no one notices them because they are trained to be unobtrusive. Their job is to record and not comment, to write orders, not give them, to witness important decisions and not to make them. Yet who has the most current intelligence at pen's and ear's end? Is not control of the means of communication an effective type of control?

The high-level scribes are trained to write in a complex shorthand that only they understand as it takes years to master, which is then translated back; they are trained to listen so well that they can repeat, verbatim, a conversation in a language they do not understand. They are taught the clues to emotion conveyed in muscle movement and in breathing as well as vocal tone, and they are trained to hide in plain sight. When dena Yeresbeth made its reappearance, enabling many to 'hear' on the mental plane without benefit of scry stones and the like, the scribe world was profoundly effected.

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