Its a Living

The Duellist is not reckoned by any as a mere profession or craft, but a title or artistry to be aspired to. A person purporting to be a duellist is not proclaiming a profession, but rather declaring their title as a person worthy of an equally skilled and entitled rival.
Nonetheless, there are those who make a living off their role as a duellist. Mostly these are foreigners who serve as teachers, or those so instructed by foreign teachers. These duelling teachers are people of professional background, rarely nobles, for a noble would be disdainful to be paid by another noble. Thus the snobbery of nobility towards each other allows people of humble origins but refined tastes to serve as teachers to the nobility. The poorest of these teachers are those who teach poorer nobility at their country estates or who teach modest merchants, in which case they usually charge one to twenty gold pieces per lesson, a lesson being an hour or two in duration.

The more successful teachers serve a large pool of nobility, allowing them to earn astonishing wages, make countless social connections, and become familiar and accepted figures in the court. For these lucky few, they can earn anywhere from twenty to one hundred gold per lesson, a price the nobility are eager to pay. It is a mark of prestige to be trained by a popular teacher whose exorbitant fees are widely known, thus broadcasting the noble's wealth.

The finest masters of duelling though rarely have to stoop to this level, for they are retained as teachers by patrons. A wealthy noble wants to be taught exclusively by their own teacher, thus their teacher's secrets are their own and not shared by rival nobles. These masters are not hirelings given a hourly wage, they are lavishly treated. They are given the finest and most fashionable of clothing, the finest of weapons, become part of the noble's entourage and are even considered the peer of the noble, and are in fact treated with respect and deference by the nobles themselves. There are few people of non-noble birth treated with such high respect, and the cost of maintaining such a duelling teacher costs is sometimes measured in the tens of thousands per year.

For those who practice duelling in a less professional manner, duelling is merely one aspect of their life, albeit an important one. Thus they retain their incomes and status from whatever their birth afforded them. Nobles will continue to use the proceeds from their holdings to support their training as duellists, merchants will continue their commerce, and so forth.

Who Would Become a Duellist?

It is a rare thing, some say a joke by Ranald, but a handful of the finest and most renowned of duellists had modest beginnings as highwaymen. Among the brigands and outlaws of the Old World, the highwayman is the noblest, a breed apart. It is natural for those who adopt the finery, firearms, and form of the nobility and duellists to be drawn to duelling, and a successful career as a highwayman affords a lucky few to purchase their way through ill-gotten gains into fashionable society. The Highwayman is in fact inspired by the art of duelling and is in some small way a tribute to it, no matter how criminal. Still, most highway men, while aspiring to the ideal of the duellist are little more than poor imitations.
Before duelling, it was traditional to resolve disputes through the employ of Judicial Champions, who would fight on behalf of the nobility, a tradition still popular and in some cases mandated by law. However, the cavalier nature of Duelling insists that sometimes a noble must fight for themselves, and not leave issues of weight import up to a hireling no matter how skilled, thus duelling has been able to compete to some extent with the trial by champion. Not surprisingly, many Judicial Champions have taken advantage of this to become Duellists themselves. The transition is not too difficult and many simply function still as Judicial Champions, duelling on behalf of the nobles, others serve as teachers, and a few lucky ones have earned titles and entered the nobility where they can practice duelling freely and independently.

However, the most common duellist are those who are Nobles of one rank or another. It is the nobility, with the wealth, leisure time, and distinct sub-culture that make duelling possible for it is their practice and patronage that forms the underpinning of duelling society. Duelling is an extension of their own particular means of conflict resolution and their martial heritage, and it is they who have so heartily embraced the art and spend so lavishly in the pursuit of it. Some say most nobles simply practice duelling due to social pressures, but a handful of nobles are deeply committed to it and are as competent and skilled as any.

While for many nobles, duelling is a hobby, for some, bloodletting is a trade. For the Protagonist, who lives by their skill with blade and fist, the opportunity to enter the duelling world is the greatest desire for many. Acceptance into the art of duelling allows them to advance socially, make more money, and carry on fighting in a socially acceptable manner that even earns them great prestige. Protagonists are often hired as muscle by nobility to carry out various deeds, and a quick-witted Protagonist can take this opportunity to earn the trust and respect of a noble and instruct them in some of the finer points of fighting. Many nobles seek out Protagonists in such a manner, for the noble can control and use the Protagonist to their own ends, using them to carry out any dirty work and using their past as a means of carefully controlling them.

Moving On…

As seductive as the art of duelling is, there are many other things in the world that demand the attention of the nobility and their entourages. For others, more pressing business means that they must put aside their practice, or at least share their devotion to it with something else.
For some, killing becomes easy, and profitable. A duellist is a person known for their skill and their cool, and those abilities can be put to other uses if the price is right. Thus some duellists, wittingly or unwittingly may serve as an Assassin to a noble who serves as their patron, carrying out the dirty work of a noble. For example, many protagonists, who through the patronage of a noble become duelists, are often beholden to their noble patrons and eventually come to serve their noble in a more secretive fashion.
Fate can be a fickle thing, and sometimes the world turns upside down, and a king becomes a peasant, and a peasant a king. Duellists, despite their position in society are not necessarily above the law and many find themselves outlaws, becoming Highwayman, acting as thieves but insisting on carrying on as if they were nobles. Other nobles, drawn to the allure of a life of crime, secretly carry on a double life as a noble-duellist by day and a gallant Highwayman by night.

Of course the art of duelling has always drawn those interested in all things military, and some duellists return to the military or seek fulfillment through a commission in the military. Thus with their money from duelling or whatever previous livelihood they had, many duellists gather together a mercenary company to test their fortunes in the world. In a way, the art of war is similar to the art of dealing, with laws and rules of its own and being a Mercenary Captain is duelling on a much grander scale, a concept that appeals to many nobles and the like.
Of course, most who practice duelling are nobles and have no interest in being anything else other than a noble. The art of duelling, if one is adept at it, does much to further one's social agenda. A popular and powerful duellist can easily influence and sway a court, gaining great prestige and honors through their expertise, even to the extent of increasing their family's fortunes by gaining titles and land through their reputation and connections.