Diamond Tiara sat with the Cutie Mark Crusaders, happily chatting with them. Her life felt so much better now that she had reformed herself. "So, how did you get your cutie mark?" Apple Bloom asked her. To her surprise, Diamond Tiara started shuddering with fear. "We're your friends, you can tell us anything. "
"Well, my mother will hurt me if anypony finds out....but then, she has been cruel to me my entire life, unlike my father who genuinely loves and cherishes me. I'll tell you, but you have to keep it quiet until I say otherwise. It's a sad story..." Diamond Tiara began to tell her tale of how she gained her Mark.
*****
Diamond Tiara clopped her hooves together in joy as her friend Silver Spoon paraded up and down in front of her, showing off her beautiful new cutie mark, a silver spoon. "So, like, what did you do to earn that wonderful mark on your flank? I can hardly wait to earn my own cutie mark and learn my own place in the world."
Silver Spoon giggled with pleasure. "Some ponies might be unkind and say I was born with a silver spoon in my mouth. But I earned this mark. My parents own one of the most exclusive jewellery shops in Ponyville and two more shops in Manehatten and Canterlot. And they let me make my first piece of jewellery ever-a silver spoon. And that was when I got my cutie mark. I'm so looking forward to my cutecenara in ten days from now. I'm sure your parents will help you find your special talent too. I need to go home now, my parents would not want me to be late for supper."
Not long after Silver Spoon left, Diamond Tiara heard a voice that she did not like very much.
"DIAMOND TIARA??! COME DOWN HERE THIS INSTANT!"
She sighed. Her mother seemed to have very little love or affection for her, and even less when her father was away on business trips as he so often was. Reluctantly she went downstairs to where her mother was waiting for her, with two identical looking unicorns in striped clothes. "Mother, where are the servants? Who are these two? And why is there a small brazier set up in the hall?"
Spoiled Rich replied "You are a growing filly, and it is time that you gained your cutie mark. The servants have all been given two whole days and nights off with pay. In my branch of the family we have a special tradition dating back many centuries in which we gained our cutie marks. It does not do to leave them to chance."
Diamond Tiara smiled. "So you're going to help me get a jewellery cutie mark, just like Silver Spoon? I look forward to that." She took her eyes off the unicorns and didn't see the muzzle, lit with unicorn magic, that floated up behind her until it clamped itself firmly over her muzzle and unicorn magic pinned her hooves to the ground.
"Mmmmmphh!" Diamond Tiara tossed her head about in a fury, trying to dislodge the muzzle without success. I know my mother has little or no love for me but why would she be doing this to me? I try my very best to be on good terms with her and to stay out of her way. She was also unable to lift her hooves from the floor, which now glowed softly with the unicorn magic that was holding them firmly in place. Spoiled Rich opened a draw and took out a long metal rod in her mouth, which had the shape of a five pointed tiara at the end of it. As she thrust it into the hot coals of the brazier, Diamond realized that she was looking at a brand and realized that her own mother was going to brand her flank with it. If she had not been muzzled her screams and pleas for mercy would have been heard in the street outside.
"This is no ordinary brand, Diamond Tiara, it is an antique from the distant ages of the Pony Wars. It has been heavily enchanted by now long dead unicorns of great power. One spell is a healing spell to fight infection and make it slightly less painful to be branded, but the more important spell is the one that will grant you a true cutie mark with the same powers as a normally gained one. I want you to have the power of leadership, and this is what this brand will give you."
Diamond Tiara struggled and tried to scream through the muzzle, and placed her tail protectively over her flank. She can't do this to me, she just can't! She's my own mother and mothers are supposed to love their daughters, not maim them. I should be free to chose my own destiny, not have it forced upon me. For Celestia's sake, don't do this to me!
The brand had a loop of metal upon it enabling it to be safely fitted onto the leg of an Earth pony, and Spoiled Rich removed it from the brazier, the tiara now glowing red hot, and started walking towards her captive daughter. "This will give you a real, useful talent, and you will thank me for it later in life when you are a high-ranking executive in some company someday. Flim, Flam, pull that tail out of the way please." A glow of unicorn magic pulled the tail out of the way, and Spoiled Rich pushed the magical brand against her daughter's quivering flank and held it there for three seconds. There was a loud hiss, the sound of burning pony fur, and a great pain in the burnt area, causing Diamond to scream in agony into the muzzle, tears spurting from her eyes. Then the brand was removed, leaving a tiara-shaped burn wound in Diamond's flank. "Film, Flam, a bowl of water-pour it over the burn please."
Having water poured on the burn did lower the pain slightly. Spoiled Rich next produced some blue paint and painted the wound. "Film, Flam, a healing spell please on the burnt area, and a shield spell to keep out infection and stop her scratching when it starts healing within a few hours. Healing wounds itch, and she'll scratch it with her hooves and chew it open if it is not shielded properly, leaving a non-magical scar on her flank. The spell might not be proof against your chewing, Diamond Tiara, so you will have a lampshade collar locked on you until it fully heals. When it does, it will grant you the same skill of a real cutie mark earned in the normal way." She locked a lampshade collar onto Diamond, with a padlock keeping it on, and ordered Film and Flam to unmuzzle Diamond and let her go once the needed spells were cast. A pink shield spell formed over the burnt area. As soon as she was unmuzzled and her legs were released, Diamond screamed at her mother. "Mother, WHY? Why put me through this pain and deny me the right to my own destiny, the happiest part of a pony's life? What you did to me must surely be illegal nowadays, and there is no way that my father would allow it!"
"I did it for the good of the family. For centuries, both before and after the right to brand your foals was abolished, my family line has been branding their foals to give them the very best chances of life that a pony can have. The mark is not just cosmetic but will grant you the some power as it would be if you had earned it in the normal way. And you will say nothing to the Royal Guards or your father about this, or it would break up our family. Do you really want your own mother, without which you would not even exist, put into prison? Do you really want to end up in some horrible care home somewhere whilst your family divorce? Do you really want to break up your father's happy marriage with the mare he loves? Also, he did not sign a pre-nup, so if he divorces me, he will lose half of his Backyard Bargains fortune. The ring that was branded upon my flank nearly forty years ago gave me the talent to find and seduce the perfect stallion for me and lifted me into the upper ranks of Equestrian society. Yours will most likely give you a chance to end up leading a company and even richer then your father-if you just give it a chance to do so."
Diamond hung her head in it's large cone of shame as she realised that her mother was probably right. At the very least, she would make her parents split up. Whilst she had very little love left for her mother at the moment, her love for her father was still great, and she did not want to put him through the stress and strains of divorce. The burning pain in her flank was already lowering to a dull ache as the magic healed the burned flesh.
Spoiled Rich kissed Diamond's forehead, and Diamond's attempt to wipe the kiss away was thwarted by the cone of shame she was wearing.
"In a couple of days you will be all better, and I'll make it up to you with one of the best cutecenaras ever once your father comes back from his latest trip to Manehatten. Flim, Flam, here are three hundred bits each for your help in the matter, and remember not to tell anypony about it. You may go now. "
Angrily Diamond Tiara went up to her bedroom wondering what she should do next, and it was not long before her flank started to itch horribly, as if ants were biting it. She tried scratching her flank with her hooves, rubbing it with her tail and against the wall, but the shield held firm. The cone of shame kept her teeth away from the itch.
"Mother, my flank itches like crazy and this shield spell won't let me scratch."
Spoiled Rich replied "A young lady like you needs to lean self control and leave her itches alone. Not only is it not ladylike to scratch like a dog, but you would tear your new cutie mark right open and end up with bleeding and a nasty, non-magical scar that might get infected. Don't make me have to muzzle you again."
*****
Diamond Tiara continued telling her tale of woe to the horrified Cutie Mark Crusaders.
"It itched like crazy for two days before it healed and the shield was lifted and I could finally scratch it, but my chance to gain my own mark and choose my own destiny had been taken away from me, and that is why I teased you three and called you blank flanks so often. I was so jealous of you because you could earn your own destinies, whilst my destiny had been chosen for me against my will by my mother. Oh yes, she and my father, who thought I had gained my cutie mark in the normal way, had a really good cutecenara for me organized by Pinkie Pie, Ponyville's premiere pony party pony, with food and presents and guests, but losing my right to my own destiny still hurt, then and now."
"That's horrible! Do you want to tell Princess Twilight about it? ," Scootaloo asked. "No pony should ever have to go through being branded like you were."
