date a selkie, but don’t hide her cloak. let her go home and visit her family now and then, knowing that she’ll come back and hang her seal cloak in the closet like she always does. trust is important.
The first time she lets the redhead take her home, she’s diligent about hiding her cloak. She folds it carefully against tears and rips and abrasions, and hides it in a sea cave whose entrance is concealed by the tide.
She does the same, the second and third and fourth times, careful, wary, mindful of her mother’s lessons. Remembers the way her mother’s hands had chafed on her soft cheeks, rough with cooking and cleaning for her fisherman husband, the way her mother’s peat-dark eyes had been tense and harsh with the lesson.
“Mind me, Niahm. Never let them find your cloak.”
The way her mother’s mouth had curved, a sickle of dissatisfaction and relief and envy, as she had escaped into the waves.
So she minds her mother’s lesson, and she takes care with her cloak.
Would that she had taken as much care with her heart.
The fifth time, she wears the cloak to the girl’s door, clutched about her throat, dripping along the darkened lanes.
She enters the home, welcomed with soft kisses and gentle touches and kindling passion. She drapes the cloak, artful in her carelessness, across an old wooden chair, the one that creaks and tilts slightly if you don’t sit just right.
When she wakes, in the wee hours of the morning, even before her lover, the cloak still rests, supple and dappled by the sea, on the back of the chair.
She frowns into the softening dawn, dons the cloak, and returns to the sea.
And again, the sixth time. And the seventh.
The eighth time, she finally breaks, prickling and hurt with longing, gripping a handful of russet hair in her hand, firm with emphasis.
“Surely you know what I am,” she says to her lover, the cool froth of sea foam and the call of gulls curling around her voice.
“Of course,” her lover responds, soft and tender in the dawnlight, throat arched willingly, pale as the inner whorls of a shell. “You taste of the sea,” the girl whispers, reverently.
She shakes her lover’s head gently, fingers tangled still in russet locks. “Why?” she demands. “Why won’t you keep me?”
A long silence that waits and fills, like a tidepool, stretches between them. Cool as a current. Deep as the Channel.
Her lover’s eyes are dark and tender. “Must I trap you to keep you, my heart? Is that the shape of love that you desire?”
She sinks into the thought, struck and stymied, remembering her mother’s harsh hands, her cold eyes. Her hand eases into russet waves, caresses where her grip had punished. Her lips press cool and damp as the sea against the arching curve of her lover’s shoulder. “What shape of love will you give to me?”
The answer is easy, quick, certain. “Myself. Only myself, whenever you should wish it. Your cloak by the door, your body in my bed, and the freedom to go, whenever you must. As long as you wish.”
It’s not an answer a fisherman could ever give, nor would think to.
The ninth time, she hangs her cloak by the door, draped in careful dappled folds next to a drying oilskin jacket.
Tag: Selkie
Thank you for doing these prompts! I love your work! “not everyone is going to hurt you” with a selkie/female reader that’s nsfw
Wow, this one got a bit longer than I’d intended, but I fell in love with this boy a bit…
ok a lot more than a bit. The nsfw bit isn’t very long, just a paragraph. I hope you like it!! It’s number five in my list of 20 requests!_____________________
Not everyone who worked at or
went to the waterfront bar was non-human, but in this little seaside town, it
was a fair bet to assume that the person sitting next to you had some kind of
gift, ability, or alternate form. There were even two packs of werewolves in the area who – miraculously – got on with each other pretty well, and only had the
smallest bouts of jocular rivalry.The owner of The Cornucopia
was a satyr named Lea, and she was known for taking in strays of one sort or
another. She’d adopted you as a favourite patron a while back during a messy
breakup, and a few members of her staff were lost souls with nowhere else to
go.On a gusty October evening,
you pushed open the doors, hair wild from the salt spray in the air outside,
and smiled instantly. The atmosphere inside was always the same, and it soothed
you to see the regulars there too. As you approached the bar, you realised that
there was a new face, however, and wow if he wasn’t the most beautiful man
you’d ever seen.He was tall, perhaps just
north of six foot, but there was a shy set to his shoulders beneath the simple,
white t-shirt he was wearing, and he looked slim and perhaps even a little
haunted. His nut-brown hair was tied back in a scruffy bun, with a few sections
falling forwards into his eyes at the front, and his cheekbones caught the soft
light of the bar in a way that made your stomach tie itself in knots. As you
neared the bar and saw him more clearly, you saw that he had beautiful, dark
brown eyes, and a slight frown to his strong brows. And freckles.You licked your lips and ran
a hand through your sea-battered hair, shrugging out of your jacket. He was
busy wiping the bar countertop down, but he caught the movement and glanced up
apprehensively.
They’re shocked when the coat is draped over their chair, dark eyes wide as they look back at you, and you smile kindly. “Why.. did you do that?” they ask, tone shocked and surprised. You tilt your head, smiling even more, and hum softly. “You dropped your coat, I wanted to make sure that you didn’t lose it. Or, so no one stepped on it. It’s gorgeous fur,” you reply with a little shrug, then an awkward wave, and head back to your table.
They continue to stare after you, until their friend taps their hand and they snap their head back to look at the other selkie at their table. Both are amazed, and a bit shocked, at the sudden, almost nonchalant marriage in the middle of dinner. They were in shock and were happy, since- even though you appeared human- you were cute and seemed to be wonderful, judging by the kind gesture of giving their coat back.
All right but PICTURE THIS.
Small seaside town? Everyone knows everyone? Maybe a lighthouse? Craggy rocks? Waves crashing against the shore? Misty mornings? Cold winds?
And our intrepid hero comes into this town, looking for something that they’re missing but they don’t know what. They fall in love with the town, with the people, and everything about the sea and decide to stay. But there’s an especially intriguing person that keeps hanging around the lighthouse and they want to get to know them!
Only asking questions doesn’t get them anywhere. Answers are vague and evasive, and people seem to know something about that attractive person.
The hero gets to know this person, slowly and gradually, but they also seem to realize that something’s not quite normal with them. The other person seems to like them, too, but they’re still rather secretive and stare off into the sea longingly at strange points. Like a raging storm.
But as things go they grow closer and like each other more and more! And fall in love!
And that’s when folks in town start warning our hero that hey, maybe you want to be careful? Things might go wrong! You never know with people like them.
Our hero already has some of the hints from having spent so much time with this lovely, mysterious person. They’ve seen a gorgeous coat in their house. They’ve seen this person disappear at the ocean and then reappear with no explanation. Even during storms!
The library has some good books to look at, and they all warn readers to beware of selkies. That romance is doomed and you should hide their coats if you want them to stay because they’re flighty and will leave forever after a certain point. Because the sea will always call them home.
Even the town folk warn our hero about selkies once they realize it’s not quite a secret anymore. That maybe they should keep an eye out for any pretty coats and make sure they’re safely locked away?
Our hero doesn’t like that kind of talk. They go to their love and they’re intending on talking to them, but the selkie gets there first.
I love you and trust you, the selkie tells our hero. I have something to tell you. What do you know of selkies?
The selkie listens to everything our hero has to say and corrects any
misassumptions
made. And then the selkie tells our hero what it means for a human and selkie to be in love. That the selkie will have to return to the sea at some points, but the selkie will return after a certain point. And the coat is important; the coat is the selkie. That any children (depending on whether our couple is male/female or same-sex) will likely also be part selkies and also have to return to the sea.
Our hero understands, and they still want to be in a relationship with this beautiful, amazing being that fell in love with them as well. That wants to stay on land for as long as possible to build a relationship with them.
The first time the selkie leaves for an extended time, the town folks tell our hero that they should’ve locked the coat away. That the selkie won’t return. That our hero should move on.
But they wait. They wait and trust that their love will return. They know practically everything a human can know about a selkie. How can they not have confidence?
And the selkie returns and they resume their lives. Even decades later, the two can still be seen walking the beach come rain or shine, hand-in-hand and always together.
All because a selkie and a human actually communicated what it meant to be in a relationship with a magical being.
Selkie Boyfriend
“Look, it’s not like I went looking
for him. I swear I’m not one of those selkies that hangs around the
human districts baiting the humans with their coats. I don’t have a
human fetish, I was just hanging out with some friends at the market.
I swear. I even made sure to keep my coat close just so there
wouldn’t be any misunderstandings.” he sighs and lights a
cigarette.
Toad's Cave 