There was a boy, Liam, who always preferred to be alone. He set his own traps, built his own curragh, and sat alone at all the family gatherings. One day, walking out around the outer islands, he saw a thing his eyes could scare believe. In them days, seals was hunted for their oil and hides, clubbed to death, and made into coats, and pouches and pampooties for the feet. But Liam never took part of it, for he believed as many did then, that there was no worse luck than to harm a seal.
Liam had seen a selkie. A creature that’s half human and half beast. Old stories told of such creatures luring ships onto the rocks and pulling sailors down into the drink. But all Liam knew was he had never seen a woman so lovely in all his life. Now it was said that whoever could capture the hide of a selkie, would have it in their power to command as they would. The selkie maid had seen men before. Fled from their fishing hooks and their spears and mattocks. But never had she seen one as glorious handsome as Liam Coneelly.
All the islanders had seen Liam roll out to sea alone and now all saw his return with the strange girl. Island people is a careful lot. Not likely to pass judgement on another person’s business in public. There was something so unearthly about the girl that soon set their tongues to wagging. There was much shaking of heads when Liam married the stranger. She hardly spoke at all, and when she did, her Irish was queer sounding. More ancient than their grandfather’s grandfather’s. And when they asked him where he’d found her, with her great dark eyes and her wild black hair, he’d only say “Trabeg.” This was nonsense because it was only a speck in the ocean that even the seals had to leave when the tide was high. And she’d always be at the water, looking out at the seals and the birds. She’d come back each day with her hands full of shellfish and seaweed which she’d simmer over a driftwood fire in a manner of her own. But all had to admit that she was a good wife to Liam. Before long, she was asking him to build a cradle for their firstborn. “It must be made of the wood of a ship that sailed the ocean,” she told him. “And there will be no need for rockers for it will rock on the motion of the sea.” It was the queerest- looking thing. More of a ship than a cradle. And carved with shells and fish and seaweed. And whenever the day was calm, they put the babe afloat on the water. Rocking on the sea with the ripple of the waves against the hull of a lullaby.
Now the years passed, and Liam and Nuala, for that’s what the selkie called herself…was happy in their work. And their love grew and they had many children. With all that, there was always a touch of sadness about Nuala. She spent long hours looking out at that that she had come from and listening to the cries of the seals on the outer islands. One of these afternoons it was her eldest, who was called Fiona, said the words to her that changed their home. “Why does father hide a leather coat in the roof?” Lather that evening, as Liam was rolling home, he was followed by a solitary seal. It seemed joyous in its movements. It rolled and dived within the waves, joyous in the sleekness of its body. But its eyes, as with all its kind, held a sadness as deep as the soul. When the seal left him at last, Liam felt a great emptiness inside, a fear, and he rowed furious for the shore, even though the sea was heavy on his oars. When he got home, it was the faces of his children told him his fears were true. For once a selkie finds its skin again, neither chains of steel nor chains of love can keep her from the sea.
From that day on, it was forbidden to harm a seal in the island, and man and beast lived side by side sharing the wealth of the sea. And sometimes the Coneellys would see her out in the waves, basking in the sun on Trabeg, watching them, watching her children. And the cradle was passed on through the years with each new infant of the Coneellys rocked upon the waves within it. And every so often, there would be one born with the dark eyes and black hair that the selkie had left in their blood. And these dark ones were most at home at sea. Great sailors and fisher folk, every one of them.
– The Secrets of Roan Inish (1994)
Moonglade Poetess 