Royal Flush (Robertus F Sparkle) - is a well known businessman, running several casinos in Las Pegasus. He was a traditional man, fitting in incredibly well with the Canterlot Elite, with a taste for high society soirees and business trips.
One such business trip to Prance, he and his assosciates head to an evening show, showcasing a duo of show jumpers: Beau De Lys, and Grace De Lys.
Both these show jumpers were known for their beauty, and as a consequence had many different suitors in their time - Royal Flush, however, was determined to make his case.
His attempts at french (or whatever the… horse pun for prance language is) was broken, and awful, and he certainly had a big ego for a small little man… but, well, Beau found him quite charming.
After some time, with Royal flying her across Equestria to see her, and paying her handsomely in gifts, he eventually asked her to marry him - and in turn giving up her show jumping career, and moving to Canterlot.
Her sister, Grace, thought this was an absolutely ridiculous notion, and was shocked to find her sister ACTUALLY considering it. She couldn’t figure out WHY her sister would give up such a promising career for this greasy man.
The two sisters fought extensively, and eventually, they come to a decision: grace will carry on her career as a solo act, and Beau would move to Canterlot and marry Royal.
Though she doesn’t exactly regret this decision, Beau finds this…. Incredibly hard. She knows very little Equestrian language, and Royal was not the charming man she had first thought he was - He was controlling, and sometimes quite cold, insisting she follow the rules of the canterlot elite - which she often struggled with due to the language barrier.
Of course, being a traditional man, Royal wanted foals - and not long after moving to Canterlot, the couple had their first foal - Spectacle, a unicorn filly. Their second daughter, Velvet, followed a few years after.
Royal pushed his high expectations heavily onto his two children - Especially onto Spectacle.
Spectacle hated this. Her father was controlling, narcisistic and abusive. When she wouldn’t do exactly as he said, even when she was still very young, he would shout and call her names.
Spectacle wasn’t alone in this of course, as Velvet often underwent the same things. Velvet was younger, and didn’t always understand what she was doing, and Spectacle instinctively tried to shield her from him.
At 16, however, Spectacle had had enough. She made the decision to move out, abandoning the family and the canterlot elite, in hopes of making her own life.
She spends a lot of time waiting tables, taking any low paying job she can to get by - she didn’t really care, so long as she was away from her family and the stuffy Canterlot environment.
During this time she fell in love with a small, rather unsuccessful street performer, named Jack Pot. They were drawn to each other, both trying to make it out on their own, with him trying to make a difference as a street performer.
His acts got too big for her, however. By all means she wanted him to succeed… but as a performer, he loved the big parties and the swanky elites with deep pockets - and as his act took off, he started surrounding himself with more and more with big name businessmen. It reminded Spectacle too much of what she had been trying to escape.
So she ran once again, finding out not long after that that she was pregnant. She makes the decision to raise this foal on the road, giving them a happy, loving life that she had been denied, even if they didnt have the money they needed.
More about that here
Meanwhile, after Spectacle leaves, the Sparkle family seems to worsen - Beau is absolutely devestated by the loss of her daughter, falling into a depression that she never quite comes out of - while Royal completely refuses to acknowledge she ever existed, instead focusing all of his attention - and pressure - onto Velvet.
Velvet internlises this a lot more than Spectacle did. She follows the rules of the elite, does as her father says, and learns very quickly not to bring up her estranged older sister.
Velvet marries her highschool boyfriend, Night Light (approved by her father, of course), and they have two children together - Shining Armour, and Twilight
Velvet has deeply internalised what her father taught her. She raised her children the same way she was taught - with incredibly high expectations.
Sadly, she fails to learn from her fathers mistakes in the end, and drives her children away from her in the future, as they begin to realise the extent of her lies and abuse
it is… so hard to summarise everything about this family into one post, so ive just done some bullet points…. there’s obviously way more, but uh… this was more about updating their designs lol
also if you want to know what happens to Grace, Beau’s sister, have a look here. the reaches of the sparkle family tree are far -
www.deviantart.com/uunicornicc…