This is Rogue's submission. 

A woman, dressed in a flowy satin robe, knelt at the foot of a tree. Her arms were crossed in reverence, and petals floated gently down from the tree's gracefully twisting branches, carressing the woman's porcelain cheeks. A breeze slithered through the open ceiling through which gentle sunshine entered. The young woman took no notice of the breeze until, while playing with the petals that fell incessantly from the tree's clutches, the wind caused a petal to land annoyingly on the woman's nose. It tickled the girl, and she opened her eyes in order to swipe the offending petal from her face. She did so, and before closing her eyes again, she glanced up at the tree's multitude of flowers. They were a rich burgundy. Now normally, this would have been a beautiful sight to the common passersby, but if the passersby knew what the burgundy petals meant they may have dropped dead with fright. Having mastered her emotions and feelings long ago, this woman merely gave a frightened shout and rushed from the room with a few petals in hand, robe billowing in her wake. She dodged other similarly dressed women as she made it to her destination, the Mother's room. Finally, she burst through the beautifully carved oaken doors, heart thrashing in her chest and breath rattling in her throat. The Mother's glasses flashed from under her hood as she stood up from her desk and stepped around it in one sweeping motion. She grasped the young woman's arms, keeping the girl from falling to the floor in fatigue.

"Sister Ambrosia! You must not exert yourself so! You could asfixiate! As a fellow Watcher of the Petals you know it is my job to keep you safe, even from your condition!" Ambrosia's eyes were clear, but her head lolled and her breath still weezed from her mouth like a damp cloud passing through a crack in a rock.

"Mother Aglaea! Look, the Tree is distressed!" She held out the burgundy petals. Aglaea's eyes widened behind the thick rims of her glasses. One of her hands went to her mouth and she gasped in her horror. Without Mother Aglaea's support on both sides, Ambrosia fell to the tiled ground under their feet. The older woman collapsed as well, and she cried out.

"Why, Ambrosia! Why did you find the burgundy petals, of all the women in this convent! WHY???" Hot tears ran down the Mother's leather-like face. Then, next to the weakened frame of Sister Ambrosia, she broke down and wept.

~~

Angelic singing surrounded the young woman, but it did nothing to improve her spirits, nor to smother her fear. Ambrosia strode down the aisle to the petaled tree, but underneath her willing face she was terrified. She gulped as the burgundy petals wafting from the tree began to swirl around her. She closed her stormy grey eyes as a last consolation against her fate. Mother Aglaea watched from a distance, with a grim look set on her slightly wrinkled face. Before long, young Sister Ambrosia was hidden from sight by whirling, burgundy petals. A tear slid down the Mother's soft cheek and she sniffed softly. The petals swirled faster and faster. Then, a dragon began to take shape in the tornado of petals. The petals latched onto Ambrosia like leeches, forming scales, horns, and wings, among other draconic features. Ambrosia crumpled, collapsing onto her hands and knees, but soon they were changed into scaly legs, as strong and sturdy as tree trunks. The petals extended to form a graceful, swanlike neck, covered in burgundy scales. A noble dragon head topped the neck, appropriately with the commanding look dragons always possess. A thick, long tail took form soon after. Then to complete the transformation, the new, draconic Ambrosia let out a deep, blood-curdling roar. Dear Mother Aglaea rushed forward, cooing and whispering to Ambrosia.

"It's okay, Ambrosia! You'll be alright!" She spread her arms out wide in a feeble attempt to calm the thrashing dragon. The dragon stopped cold in her gigantic tracks, crystalline tears running down burgundy scales. The only thing that remained of the physical Ambrosia was the grey eyes from which the tears flowed. The petals stopped falling from the tree.

~~~

Question: so we could do poetry, but you'd prefer short stories? In any case, I might do this but we'll see.

Interesting, I like the idea. I might join if I have time.

Well that's it so FAR but it's not done...

I was reading back through the post and boy, are there a ton of misspellings! I used my phone a while ago for a "frequently misspelled words" project, and it must've added those words to my auto-correct. Technology, ladies and gentleman. My apologies!

Alexia smiled down at the challenge that faced her. Written on a scrap of paper, the message read “Find the secret to Burgundy” in a scrawly handwriting that looked like it belonged to a super villian in a movie. The teenage girl slowly twirled her long, blond ponytail as she looked up at the large oak tree that the note had fallen from. Most likely, as her logical twin sister Summer had said, it came from some kid’s secret-land game and got blown away. But in Alexia’s mind, it was a message from a knight who needed her to help him because he got captured by an evil king. She supposed that was what reading fantasy did to her, but she didn’t mind. She liked having a powerful imagination, even if it meant she wasn’t as smart as Summer. But that was okay. She would help this knight, Alexia decided, because in her mind, it was real. But she would need her twin’s help, because for starters, Alexia didn’t know what burgundy was.

After googling the word “burgundy” and having Summer holler in her ear about how Wikipedia wasn’t a trustworthy source, nor were the other random “.com”’s that showed up first on the search, Alexia finally found what she was looking for.

“Burgundy,” she read aloud off of the website. “A historical region in France that is famous for its burgundy wines. Capital- Dijon. Area- twelve thousand-” She has just realizing that a region in France probably had a secret when her big sister Maddie, who was smart and pretty and the most popular girl in school, looked over her shoulder at the computer.

“Burgundy wine and Dijon mustard?” Maddie laughed, flicking her long, light brown ponytail out of her face. “What, another wellness project about food?” She smiled her brilliant smile at her little sister, laughing.

“Actually,” Alexia corrected, even though it made her feel much younger than her thirteen years. “I’m on a secret mission from an knight who got captured by an evil king.” Summer, who had just come sliding into the room with a giant world-map book, nodded, confirming that it was true. Maddie raised her eyebrows.

“And where did you two get this idea?” Maddie had laughter in her eyes, like she was all ready to tell her high school friends about how adorable her little sisters were being. Summer explained that Alexia had found a note in a tree.

“Well, Alexia said that it fell on her from the gods or something, and like, even though I still don’t really believe it, it’s fun to research and pretend and, like, to find the geography, and like, it’s just fun.” She obviously wasn’t really paying attention, because halfway through she stopped to ask Alexia where in France the site said Burgundy was.

“Of course.” Maddie smiled, still that spark of laughter behind her glasses. “Can I see this note?” Alexia could almost hear the doubt in her older sister’s voice, so she pulled the paper out of her pocket and handed it up to Maddie. Maddie raised her eyebrows as she scanned it, then burst out laughing. She turned it over and smirked, then bellowed another loud laugh.
“Going through old phonics books?” She laughed, her eyes glimmering as she left the room. Alexia and Summer stared down at the backside of the paper. “Did your reading knight find that the second ‘u’ makes an ‘a’ sound? If so, move on to the next quest!” Summer slammed her map book down and burst into laughter as she, too, walked away.

“A reading knights phonics book!” Alexia could hear her sister exclaim. She stared down at the paper once again, sad that it wasn’t real, but knowing that it could at least be real to her characters. She opened up Google Docs and got to work.