Selkie flash fiction
"Oops, dropped your coat," you say, handing the jacket back to the beautiful stranger. They look at you in shock as they take it from your hands.
"You didn't take it," they say as if they can't believe it.
You squirm, then awkwardly say, "of course not. It doesn't belong to me"
You walk away as they continue to stare at you, clutching the coat.
The next day you're walking to your favorite Cafe when the stranger appears at your side, wearing the same coat. They ask where you're going and before you know it you're seated at your favorite table with them, talking about your life over a latte. They try to pay for you but you insist on handling it, appreciating spending time with them. They ask if they can see you again and you eagerly agree.
The next day they show up during your lunch break, with fish & chips for you. It's the best you've ever tasted, but seeing they don't have anything to eat you insist on sharing. They are obviously delighted by this. You make plans to meet again.
So the months go, with you slowly falling in love with them, their generosity, their humor, their ability to make every day better. Finally late one night they tell you the truth: they are a selkie and you could have trapped them by taking their coat. It's what most humans would do. But giving it back intrigued them, made them want to know you better, to understand your kindness. With trembling hands they hold out a second coat, asking if you will marry them and join them among the seal folk.
You can't imagine a life without them, and quickly agree.
- m daimler
Fairy related thoughts:
Probably the most dangerous assumption that's embedded in the idea of 'good' and 'bad' fairies is the belief that the 'good' ones are on the side of humanity, and that all fairies must be either 'good' or 'bad'.
Fairies are always ultimately on the side of themselves. Or Themselves, as it were. They can and may aid humans or establish connections to them but they will still put their own agendas first.
Sentient beings are going to do what they choose to do, but generally that will be what is in their own best interests. Anthropocentricism is a misleading mindset when considering things that aren't human.
I see so many people saying they would love to be kidnapped into Fairy.
It really makes me wonder what they expect to happen. Afterwards.
Folklore and anecdotes are clear that the Good Neighbors only take humans for a purpose. Servants. Entertainers. Breeding stock. Wet nurses. Food. Very rarely this ends well for the human but most often it doesn't.
If you wander into the woods, step into a fairy ring, are taken into the Otherworld what do you actually think is going to happen to you that makes the idea seem desirable?
I see people saying anything would be better than what they have now. Given the possibilities, I'd be careful what I wish for. There are worse things than scrubbing fairy chamber pots for eternity, like ending up as an appetizer.
Today's random fun fact: the term 'cold iron' refers to weapons made from iron. It's been replaced in modern vernacular with the term 'cold steel' often meaning guns, sometimes confused with 'cold-formed steel' a modern process of steel making for building materials.
When you see references to cold iron in older stories, anecdotes, and folklore they usually mean iron knives or swords.
If you run across a suggestion to carry cold iron to protect against baneful magic or beings any edged or pointed iron or steel object will work.
There's a story in Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries from Ireland that goes like this.
So the Good People expect clean water to be left out for them at night. And in this one house the serving girl was lazy and forgot. So that night when the Good People came in they found no clean water left out for them, and they were angry because they needed it to make their bread. So they pricked the sleeping girl and took some of her blood to use in place of the water. And the girl fell ill after that and was getting sicker until a man came by who knew where some of the bread was hidden in the house. Only eating a bit of the fairy bread made with her blood could cure her.
#fearthefairies
Just thought that was worth sharing with all you fine people. Consider it food for thought.
"It seems that, however unconscious of time the bemused mortals in their midst may be, the fairies themselves are pretty tightly kept to a time schedule. Not only are they active at May Day and All Hallows, Lady Day and Lammas, but Midsummer and Christmas also sees them busy. These rival dates are so important and so near to each other as to incline one to guess that the fairies were formerly worshipped by two different sets of people, one which divided the year by June and December, and the other by May and November. Possibly they were respectively agriculturalists and shepherds, for the fairies show interest both in cattle and crops."
- K. Briggs, The Fairies in Tradition and Literature
So I see a lot of people (outside the Otherkin community) discussing or feeling like they might be a fairy soul born into a human body.
There's a tendency to use a folkloric term to describe this - changeling - which really doesn't fit very well imo. Changelings are a very particular thing that doesn't involve a person born with a different soul.
I'd like to suggest people consider the term faeborn instead.
It's concise, descriptive, and speaks to the actual situation people are talking about.
Fae soul in a human body? Faeborn.
I'd also suggest people look into the Otherkin community in general or the Silver Elves specifically. There's a lot of history to this idea.
