Encyclopaedia Argollica

Selkies

The White Islands more than deserve their name. Located in the southern ocean, they consist of several archipelagoes that stretch down to the southern icecaps. The northernmost of them possess some trees, while the snow thaws during their brief summers, but in the south the ice is eternal and the inhabitants are subject to the long polar nights and days. Few land animals make their home here aside from birds, but the waters teem with whales, seals and all kinds of fish.

The selkies were made to thrive in this environment. They are not dissimilar to were-creatures, in that they can switch between animal and human form, although they always maintain some seal-like features such as large dark eyes and freckled skin. But their method of shifting is quite different, being dependent on their seal-coat, which not only helps them transform but also drives away the cold. As such, they can freely shift between the water and land, being insulated from the Islands' harsh temperatures in both situations.

Due to these adaptations, the selkies have managed to thrive in the cold southern oceans. At first they lived much as seals would, hunting for fish in small pods and sleeping in the water or on beaches. But without competition from other monsters or even many wild animals, they were able to exploit the possibilities of their environment to a great extent. Now they live in small villages, each of which controls a certain area and associated fishing-grounds, and in the case of the villages they established on the coasts of the southern icecaps, inland hunting grounds as well. These villages usually consist of about ten to fifteen families and are made up of several large, semi-subterranean dugouts, clustered together. These dwellings, insulated from the chill winds, can range in size and shape from simple oval rooms with a few side-spaces for storage to large networks of many rooms linked by a maze of passageways.

Each village is led by two figures: the shaman and the huntmaster. The shaman primarily conducts religious ceremonies and deals with any supernatural issues the community faces. Alongside this, she also records the community's history and uses that knowledge to advise the village about historical precedents when disputes need to be settled. The master of the hunt in turn organises the community's hunting and food gathering, as well as leading its warriors during wars. Unlike the shaman, who is taught by the community's previous shaman, the huntmaster is elected by the community until she steps down or dies.

There are no units of organisation above these villages, although sometimes two or three smaller settlements will essentially work together as a village would. It seems that they have no need for a larger state. However, family and friendship ties often bring several villages together in informal alliances, and trade between the islands is lively, especially in wood from the north.

Unsurprisingly, given the harsh climate of their home, selkies subsist on anything they can find. Their primary way of procuring food is still fishing in seal form. However this is no longer done to catch the fish individually, but rather to chase them into fish traps. Large creatures like whales are also hunted in kayaks. Meanwhile, on land, birds are hunted through traps and slings and their nests raided for eggs. The communities who live on the southern ice have managed to grow to much larger sizes than those in the north since their regular penguin hunts provide an extra source of food for comparatively little effort. Finally, some of the northern islands also keep small herds of sheep, but this is more for wool than for meat.

The only animals from their environment the selkies do not eat are seals. In fact the eating of seals is seen as akin to cannibalism, and the killing of seals is avoided as much as possible. While selkies do not see themselves as humans shifting into seals or seals shifting to humans, and indeed simply see themselves as selkies, they still recognise the seals as their kin, to the point of believing they were created from the animals. This is not surprising, given the fact that selkies give birth in seal form and their pups take on the form of seals at first. It is only when they are on land and dry that they instinctively shed their skin and gain the power to shift back and forth between both forms.

These skins are, naturally, extremely precious to them, hence why the First Peoples in times past could use the possession of a skin as considerable leverage over a selkie. Great care is taken in their preservation, to the point where a selkie will refuse to wear her pelt in dangerous situations like battles for fear it will get torn too severely. Losing a skin is described as akin to losing one's soul. Unsurprisingly, selkies who suffer such a fate enter a state of deep depression they rarely recover from without help.

This does not mean that such a selkie is doomed however, even if their original skin is irrevocably lost. All selkie shamans know the ritual that can create a replacement skin. The shaman must seek out a seal, preferably an old or sick one, and ask it if it would be willing to give up its skin. If the seal assents to the request, it is taken back to the village, treated to lavish meals of fish and a cozy environment for a few days, before being taken into a lone hut by the shaman. There the ritual takes place in all secrecy, and by morning the seal is buried like an honoured member of the community and the new skin will be given to the selkie who had lost hers. This pelt never feels as good as the old one did. Those who I have spoken to who were in possession of such a skin likened it to a prosthetic limb. But it is usually enough for them to regain some of their former liveliness, even if they are never quite the same again. But not all thus afflicted are willing to accept this solution due to the sacrifice that it requires, and some choose to waste away instead.

Selkie religion centres on a triad of gods. The first of these is Murra, the lady of the sea. She lives in the depths of the ocean and rules all the creatures that live there. The night is also her domain. Her counterpart is Asha, the lady of the sky. She is the opposite and rival of Murra: she lives in the sky and is the ruler of birds and land-creatures and the goddess of the day. Since selkies move between the land and the sea and depend upon the creatures of both for their sustenance, it is vital for them to remain on good terms with both of these goddesses. Therefore the selkies often organise elaborate rituals of thanksgiving for them and the shamans make spirit-journeys to visit the two deities to act as a mediator between them and the ordinary selkies. The goddesses also take the souls of dead selkies as compensation for what they take from their environment, with those who die in the water going to Murra and those who die on land belonging to Asha.

The third goddess in this triad is Níc. Whereas the other two are deities of the natural world, she governs the domains of justice and war and is usually depicted in the company of dogs, creatures so involved with settled selkie society that it is no wonder that they are the symbol for a god much more focused on culture than nature. She does not get as much attention as the other gods, her domains being much less important in day-to-day life. But according to myth, she receives all souls slain in war and in executions, and she is more than happy to inflame debates and conflicts to get her due.

The selkie are a rather insular people, and for good reason. There is, of course, the simple fact that the islands on which the selkies live are themselves quite isolated, except from each other. For a long time, the only evidence they had of the existence of other intelligent creatures was the ruins of port cities built by humans during the last age, when the area's climate was much more temperate. Stories are told of the ghostly dog-creatures that built these ruins and still haunt them at night, an association which makes sense given the first selkie dogs were likely feral dogs found in human ruins. But it has to be said that the selkies' experiences with the mainland monsters have, historically, been less than welcoming. Shipwrecks regularly cause selkies to wash up on shores in the north, and the locals there have a habit of stealing the coats of the selkies in question to force them to obey their orders, or even to marry them. This has quickly soured the selkies' desire to maintain much contact with these northerners, and though outsiders are welcome to come trade in the Islands, they are kept under tight supervision.