Wives/captains/companions in this one?

[Dri]

When the game crashed out of nowhere after I was told I needed to leave the first island -- and lost at least half an hour of battles fought -- I've stopped playing this game till at least the first major bugfix patch comes out.

So, since I am only at pretty much the very start of the game I am curious if you get a type of companion with more equipment slots. Legends had wives, Armored Princess had companions... what does WotN have?

...I heard something about making a valkyrie the "chief valkyrie". Is that what it is? Not gonna lie, if its just the valkyries and not unique NPCs you can find hidden throughout the game world I am gonna be kinda bummed. I get that the valkyries are sorta hidden and unique but they're ALREADY part of the story and not something of a bonus/option like the wives and companions were from the other games.