choose your fighter - teen wolf hcs (selkie, swan maiden/swan shifter, lauma)
wc: 1.3k
pairing: none, a few "let's be real if someone walks into a fairy circle by accident it's probably going to be Stiles" moments
genre: canon lore expansion??
warnings: standard body horror-adjacent selkie stuff, mentions of curses
summary: have you ever wondered how your favorite mythical creature fits into the teen wolf universe? well now you don't have to baybeee! here's a little look into life as a selkie, a swan maiden/swan shifter, and a lauma in Beacon Hills.
next up: sin eater, nymph, brownie
a/n: actually obsessed with Laumas now!!! hell yeah mythology articles on wikipedia!!!!
Selkie
This could work a few ways. But one point of consistency is that you have a really soft, snuggly piece of outwear that you always have with you but never actually wear. Maybe it’s a cardigan or hoodie or fur coat or some other kind of jacket. Maybe it’s a shawl or scarf or flannel. Doesn’t matter. What matters is it keeps you warm, and allows you to shift between your human and seal form.
Now, Selkie purists will say that you must be EITHER in the form of a human OR seal in order to be a selkie, but this is teen wolf we’re talking about. I feel like you probably end up as some sickass merfolk seal hybrid looking thing, that when in the water is easily mistaken for a literal seal. Hence the confusion. I think that all these examples work well to illustrate the vibe we’re going for. Also your face would look sick as FUCK. anyway, unlike werewolves and werecoyotes and wereseals (which YES are a similar but separate species), Selkies like yourself (or… like yourselk if you will) don’t transform under a full moon. The way they transform is by fully putting on their seal skin, which as we’ve established in this case, is an enchanted piece of outerwear that you’ve had from birth, and grows with you. If you put it on, you transform into a full selkie. Take it off and you’re back to human.
Selkies are OBVIOUSLY protective over their skins, since historically men have stolen them to trap your kind in their human form just so they can have a hot selkie wife. Which is totally understandable to want that bad but HORRIBLY morally corrupt to actually do. Some selkies feel safest with their skin on them at all times, some feel safest hiding it somewhere safe. Maybe you keep yours tied around your waist LITERALLY all the time, maybe you keep it hidden in a box you locked and duct taped to the underside of your bed. Your call. The point is you are tied to your selkie skin so deeply that if anything harmed it, if it got cut or burned or destroyed, it would hurt you too. The tie runs so deep that if you were to drop your skin and someone picked it up to give it back to you, you’d be magically linked to that person for eternity. So pick out some engagement rings just in case your favorite character (probably Stiles let’s be real. He’d so marry a selkie by accident) unintentionally and irreversibly weds you on a school night!
Swan maiden/swan shifter
Swan maidens/swan shifters have traditionally been depicted as women in lore, but guess the fuck what? It’s teen wolf bitch, there are no rules! Run around and tear shit off the walls! Go crazy! (SO FUCKING MAD I cannot find the full sketch online PLEASE just watch I think you should leave you will pee your pants) ANYWAY. A swan maiden/swan shifter can be anyone. They are really really rare, because they are… usually just a regular person that’s been cursed.
Maybe it’s a byproduct of some nefarious scheme, maybe your humanity was sacrificed so someone else could gain power, maybe a warlock or druid tried to curse you to save your life. Point is, you now exist as a swan during the day. You can return to your human form at night, but only when the moon is out. And unfortunately for you, moonrise and moonset have nothing to do with the time of night. So even when the moon is visible during the day, you’re still a bird. At night when there’s no moon out? Bird. But whenever the moon IS out at night, (being visible is up to you, whether clouds effect it or not) BOOM. You’ve got thumbs.
The problem is that swan maidens/swan shifters are basically impossible to detect for most people and creatures. Your transformation is a very short lived burst of magic, and within seconds it starts to fade. So unless you happen to be near a werewolf right at moonrise/moonset during the night where they can smell the change in your scent as you go from human to bird, or unless you happen to be shot by accident by a werewolf hunter and turn back into a gorgeous gorgeous human right as someone approaches… the odds of anyone finding out are low.
I personally like the whole “true love’s first kiss” bit as a way to break the curse, or at the very least needing some kind of first kiss to seal a magical ritual that brings you back into your human form for longer. Whoever the lucky bitch is will be finding downy little feathers in their bed for weeks after.
Lauma
Originating in the Baltic region, in countries like Lithuania and Latvia, Laumas (the teen wolf version) are sort of a fairy-woodland spirit-witch kinda thing. Like other types of witches, Laumas tend to be women, but there are also ABSOLUTELY male and gnc and non binary Laumas too. Horses, goats, bears, and dogs are all very connected to you. Sometimes when you’re asleep, you can shift into one in order to get information. This is a full body transformation, not any sort of humanoid-hybrid thing. Anyone looking at you like that wouldn’t see anything other than a regular old stray dog, or a random bear that strayed too far from the woods. The good news is seeing a stray dog, a black bear, or a wild horse in northern California won’t raise too many eyebrows. But since goats aren’t native to the region, that might be… a little more suspicious.
The good news is that you can also talk to dogs, goats, bears, and horses. Sort of like a witch’s familiar, they’ll usually help you out if you need them to, and you feed them treats or look out for them in return. The amount of times you’ve woken up to a huge, fully grown wild bear trying to sneak into your house is so high you’re not even surprised by it anymore. One of your best skills is making your special hot coco recipe. It’s actually a jazzed up version of an old Lauma trick, a way to use rocks and magic and cow’s milk to create a pretty much never ending beverage with healing properties.
You’re also good with fiber arts. Traditionally it’s weaving, but you could be into knitting, crochet, embroidery, macrame, hell even friendship bracelets or rainbow loom for christ’s sake. Everything you make has a sort of hazy prismatic glint in the fiber, like rainbows get spun into the yarn or thread just from your touch. You probably live in dense, hard to navigate woods, and/or by bodies of water like lakes or ponds or rivers. You feel drawn to isolated meadows, and even when there’s none anywhere else, dew will gather around wherever you’ve been. Also expect to leave rings in the grass if you’re somewhere long enough. They’re similar to fairy rings, but usually yours appear as circles of moss and rocks instead of mushrooms and clovers. You also have the ability to make rain fall by singing, dancing, or getting pissed off enough to cast a curse (sometimes unintentionally). This of course can escalate to thunder storms and hail if it gets bad enough. You’re a natural at domestic tasks, and have an innate ability to make anywhere feel like a home, plus children LOVE you. Babies never cry when you’re around, and you can tell the fate of a child just by looking at them. Sick as FUCK.