Selkie - Scottish

The salt spray feels like a memory on my skin, even when I walk on the land. My name is Isla, and I carry the ocean in my heart, a constant tide that pulls me toward the shore. Long ago, on the misty coast of the Orkney Islands, the waves crashed against black rocks, and the wind sang lonely songs through the heather. It was there, on a bright day in early June, that I first felt the warmth of the sun as a human girl. You see, I am not always as I appear; I am one of the seal-folk, and this is the story of the Selkie. I remember the joy of dancing on the sand, my sealskin left shimmering on a rock, the one precious link to my true home. The air was crisp, the sun a gentle warmth, and the freedom of having legs was a delightful, if clumsy, novelty. I danced not for an audience, but for the sheer bliss of feeling the solid earth beneath my feet, a world so different from the fluid, weightless kingdom I knew beneath the waves. But that joy was fleeting, for a young fisherman, with eyes as grey as the sea in a storm, saw my sealskin. He approached not with malice, but with a profound and misplaced wonder. He took it, thinking it a great prize, a treasure from the depths. He could not have known he was stealing my very soul, anchoring me to a world where I did not wholly belong.

Without my skin, I could not return to the waves, to my family beneath the surface. The fisherman, whose name was Ewan, was kind. He was captivated by me, this strange girl with sorrowful eyes who seemed to hear music no one else could. He hid my skin in a locked chest, believing he was protecting his newfound treasure, and I, bound to the land, became his wife. I learned the ways of humans: how to mend nets that felt like cages, how to bake bread that tasted of earth instead of salt, and how to sing lullabies to our children. I loved my children, a boy and a girl, with a fierce and aching love that was both my greatest joy and my deepest sorrow. They had his grey eyes but my wild heart. But every night, after they were asleep, I would walk to the cliffs and listen to the call of the seals, my kin, their voices a painful reminder of all I had lost. I would tell my children stories of a kingdom of shimmering kelp forests and coral castles, and they thought them just fairy tales, never guessing their mother was a queen of that underwater realm. Years passed, maybe seven, maybe more. Time on land moves differently, each day a slow, grinding stone. I never stopped searching, quietly, for the key to that locked chest, for the piece of myself that was missing. My longing was a constant, hollow ache, a silent song of the sea that never left me.

One blustery afternoon on October 15th, while Ewan was out at sea battling a coming storm, my youngest daughter found an old iron key tucked away in her father's forgotten coat. Curious, she took it to the dusty attic, a place of forgotten things, and opened the sea-worn chest. Inside, folded carefully, was my sealskin, still soft and smelling of salt and magic. She brought it to me, her eyes wide with wonder. The moment I touched it, the call of the ocean became a roar in my ears. The choice was the most painful one a heart could make. I kissed my sleeping children goodbye, a tear for each, a salty drop for the land-bound lives they would lead. Then I ran to the shore, my heart a storm of grief and exhilaration. The transformation was instant and overwhelming—a rush of cold, the familiar weight of the water, the power in my limbs. I was home. I saw Ewan's boat returning, and I swam near, my seal eyes meeting his human ones one last time before diving deep. Our story became a whisper on the wind, a tale told by islanders to their children about the beautiful, mysterious women of the sea. It reminds them that some things—like the ocean, and the heart—can never be truly tamed. The myth of the Selkie lives on, inspiring haunting songs, beautiful poems, and paintings that capture the longing for a home you can never forget. It teaches us about identity, love, and loss, and it keeps the magic of the sea alive in our imagination, connecting us to the wild spirit that lives in the world and within ourselves.