Thank you, my friend! I am glad you are enjoying it! I hope the death of the cow didn't hit too hard, and if it's any consolation - I cried while writing it. I love cows, all animals really, it was hard. And I'm not sure where all the women are, lol. MC just isn't around many other people their age, in general, at least in the glimpse you get into their early life (there will be more memories and new characters that pop up later though). Willow, who becomes Lakota's wife, doesn't get screen time for the sake of story-focus (yet, more on her in ch 6 in future), but she's probably the main woman around MC that is around their age. The twin sisters are a decent bit older and have this silent-watcher thing going and Betony is more of a mom role. It's not intentional, I can promise you that. I also don't care much for typical gender roles so I tend to write male characters that fill roles you typically see for women characters or with characteristics that tend to get stereotyped as feminine. And I like women-badies (that goes for villains big and small, and general badasses). The Twinflower women have some secrets, btw. I hope it isn't too much of a downer and dampens your enjoyment. ^_^