Fathomless by Anne M. Pillsworth

creation-eidolons, a sort of cosmic library.”
    Daniel typed like a madman. He and Sean had decided Daniel should take notes for them both, while Sean, the better artist, should copy drawings. He embellished his version of Marvell’s diagram with letters, an A in Azathoth’s “stomach,” an N crowning Nyarlathotep, a Y protruding from Yog-Sothoth like the legs of a stick figure plunged into the acid seething of the librarian god.
    Marvell droned on. “Only Nyarlathotep can fashion creation-eidolons, but all magicians impose will on force, intending it to do one thing or another. Some intentions direct energy, while other intentions substantiate it, making it material or changing one material into another. Daniel, some examples of directed force?”
    Daniel reeled off, “Telekinesis, telepathy, precognition, illusion, clairvoyance, pyrokinesis.”
    â€œSean, of substantiated force?”
    The first one was easy: “Summoning, Professor, if you give the summoned thing an actual body in our plane.”
    â€œAnd?”
    â€œUm, alchemy, and shape-shifting.”
    â€œYes. And?”
    There was a major one with a name he couldn’t remember under the stress of Marvell’s gaze. “Some psycho-thing. Shub-Niggurath does it.”
    Marvell cocked an eyebrow, then drew in red a tree trunk with toothy mouths and flailing tentacles. “Shub-Niggurath, who transforms creation-eidolons from idea to reality. We call the process?”
    Psycho, psycho, psycho-something from the Bible—
    But Marvell waited only seconds before asking, “Do you know, Daniel?”
    Cornered, Daniel had to answer: “Psychogenesis, Professor.”
    Okay, Sean wouldn’t have come up with that anytime soon. Still.
    Marvell gave Daniel an approving nod. “Correct. But psychogenesis belongs solely to the Outer Gods. Let’s return to the kind of intentions that have practical applications in human magic—”
    Practical applications, finally. Sean jumped in: “Professor? I was wondering—so, I formed a magical intention when I summoned the Servitor?”
    Marvell had begun to erase the board. He didn’t turn back to the table until he had finished. “No, that’s exactly what you didn’t do. Orne gave you a spell devised by Enoch Bishop, and the intention to summon a certain familiar is inherent in its symbolism and incantations. To put it bluntly, Sean, you borrowed Enoch Bishop’s intention. His will formalized.”
    â€œBut I was the one who intended to call this Servitor, so doesn’t that count?”
    Marvell gazed upward; when he spoke, it was to the distant ceiling: “I’m concerned, Sean. You always drift back to the summoning. It strikes me you’re trying to make one act of secondhand magic into your claim to fame.”
    The ice water always on the table during class remained on its tray, but Sean felt as though a poltergeist had poured the whole pitcher down his back. Daniel’s chair creaked. Sean didn’t dare look at him, so he kept looking at Marvell.
    And Marvell kept addressing the ceiling: “That’s not necessary, you know. The Order acknowledges the potential that allowed you to act as an extension cord between Enoch’s intent—the spell—and the energy Enoch’s Master gifted you. But you didn’t shape the intent or independently gather the energy, and it will be some time before you learn how. So slow down, please. Stop dwelling on last summer and keep to the task at hand.”
    â€œI didn’t mean it like that, Professor.”
    â€œPerhaps not, Sean.”
    Daniel’s chair hadn’t creaked again. Was he still there? Yeah, but he was posing for a statue of Dude Totally Absorbed in His Laptop.
    â€œWell,” Marvell said, and smiled as if he hadn’t just delivered a swift nut-kicking. “We’ll continue tomorrow. I have a seminar in Boston. You two