Selkie

Selkies are found near the islands of Orkney and Shetland in Scotland. They are able to transform into human form by shedding their seal skins and can revert to seal form by putting their skin back on. In human form they are described as handsome and seductive. Male selkies typically seek those who are unhappy with their romantic lives, including fishwives.

· The male Selkies can create storms and are responsible for the sinking of ships, especially in revenge for the hunting of seals.
· If a female wishes to make contact with her selkie family, she must go to a beach and shed seven tears into the sea.
· If a man steals a female selkie's skin, she will be forced to become his wife.

Female selkies are said to make excellent wives, but because their true home is the sea, they will often be seen gazing longingly to the ocean. If her skin is found she will immediately return to her home — sometimes, her selkie husband — in the sea. Stories concerning selkies are generally romantic tragedies. Sometimes the human will not know that their lover is a selkie, and wakes to find them gone. Other times the human will hide the selkie's skin, thus preventing them from returning to seal form.

Selkies are not always faithless lovers. One tale tells of the fisherman Cagan who married a seal-woman. Against his wife's wishes he set sail dangerously late in the year, and was trapped battling a terrible storm, unable to return home. His wife shifted to her seal form and saved him, even though this meant she could never return to her human body and hence her happy home.