Anna had gathered together her Ducal Council, the six elected officials and herself ran the day to day affairs of the island and Anna traditionally had taken a rather hands on approach. She'd been encouraged by Sir Peter Henderson to give them more responsibility andthe tall greying 70 year old former Horseman who represented the city from which the island took its name kind of had a point. Anna wasn't really a political figure she was more a figure head and while she wanted to keep busy it was best she delegate some of her powers. The problem was for the next 12 months she'd be largely gone on various trips with the Grand Duke, it was a golden oppurtunity to learn the big job of Grand Duke and put her homeland on the map.
Anna was rather looking forward to the meeting and meet Joshua at the top of the steps. "Thank you for agreeing to this meeting." she escorted him through the garden and to the patio at the back where a large table waited. "I thought it would be good for you to get a handle on Wellow before we sit and discuss the offer I'm considering. I mean if its too warm for you then perhaps you'd not be up for the job." As they rounded the side of the house the quiet chatting of the six councillors came to ear. "The Ducal Council are like my little Parliament, between the seven of us we can set economic policy, education policy, health and various other areas." She waited for each of the six to introduce themselves, the last being Peter Henderson.
"Your Grace" the older man extended a hand, "Welcome to Wellow. I have to say when The Duchess here explained her crazy plan of recruiting a foreign Governor type I was worried, especially when I thought we may get that hippy Carpenter, but a armour veteran I can live with" he pointed to his veterans badge of the Horseman of Jekar, "We may have only had little tanks but Helus knows I loved the excitement, still its all flashing lights and computers now" he seemed a little sad at the thought of the mechanics of it all going. "Please take a seat." he offered Joshua the seat next to him.
"Now I know you probably have as many questions for us as we do for you" Anna took over, "But I thought if we started with some background. Wellow is the largest of the Bakkermayan islands, we have a population of just over 4.5million of us. Ethnically we're a wonderful mix of Morelanders, Paracambians, few rouge Lodjains too. Religiously we're roughly 60% Cultists, 30% Helusan, and the rest are a mixture of Vodou, Rastafari and a few Christians, we've even a small enclave of Odinists down on the south coast. We've a decent tourist industry, I mean who doesn't like a nice warm beach. We've also got a mixture of some older established industry such as some cotton farming and coffee, but we've diversified in the last few years into things such as software development, micro-electronics and the like. The average household incomes around $41,000 but cost of living is relatively low. So anything else you'd want to know?" Anna poured him a glass of iced water with a sprig of mint floating in the jug while she spoke.
