Border Rostay was a close friend of the colonial founder, Niklaus Aquila, as Rostay, a prominent industrialist financier had often bankrolled Aquila's daring experiments, and over time, this had brought great profit to both parties. In the experiment of the colony on the planet now known as Aquila, Border had been assigned to look over all mineral extraction operations; when the time came that Aquila was made a Royal Duchy, Border Rostay was an easy choice to head that House to which was assigned the duties of mining and quarrying.
When came the Ascension of Divis Mal, House Rostay was hardest hit of all the Aquilan Houses. Entrenched into mining the now-useless Aquilanium, the entire Rostay treasury collapsed. Their few investments off-world were consumed in the debt, and most of them then failed. The Duke at the time, Mikhael III, an Anderon, recalled many a loan Rostay had taken, and the House was driven near to bankruptcy in a matter of days.
Lord Clovis, who then headed House Rostay, is reputed to have conferred at some length with Gerden, Lord of House Ffrench, who would in a months' time lead the rebellion that would instigate a civil war and interregnum lasting forty-five years. Yet the evidence clearly indicates that by the time Lord Ffrench first stormed the Nest, in October of 2751, Lord Clovis was at odds with House Ffrench, and had refused to take part.
During the interregnum, Rostay began by supporting House Anderon, but when Lord Clovis died in the Conflagration of 2757, and with the ascent of his brother, Lord Strom Rostay, the House switched allegiances to House Windhaven, who had gone renegade in their own mad dash for the Coronet. Strom Rostay was slain by his own commander, in the Third Siege of Hoberty Keep, in 2776, and his successor, Lord Calvin Rostay, was consumed in the fire he himself had set to the Keep in the same siege, two weeks later. The next successor, his grandson, Lord Armitage Rostay, then picked up camp, withdrew from the siege, and spent eighteen years in seclusion, refusing to commit his troops to any faction.
He emerged from seclusion, in 2794, to combat the Windhavens, who were marching to usurp the pretender, Lord Inigo Ffrench, in their own name. The Battle of Donal's Mill, as it has since been called, might have been indecisive, except that Lord Windhaven called an early retreat, and the Rostays easily rode the frightened and disorganized usurpers down. In the remaining two years of the Interregnum, Armitage Rostay would defend the city of Aquila, against any attempt to remove the would-be Duke.
In 2796, Vladmir I, a Bahlmis, approached the gates of Aquila. Vladmir asked Rostay to stand aside, and if he would kneel, be maintained as Lord of Rostay. When Rostay was apprised of Vladmir's full host, he realized that his own men were far outmatched. Nevertheless, he refused, at first, sure that the only way to bring peace to Aquila was to unite behind one Duke, and certain that the Ffrenches would provide the needed stability. When, however, he was further apprised of the growing decadence and weakness of the Ffrench forces within, Rostay realized that to protect House Ffrench was not only suicide, but dishonorable.
He knelt to Lord Bahlmis, and was rewarded for his steadfastness and valor, as Lord Bahlmis had promised. That very afternoon, Vladmir I himself carried out the execution, of Inigo Ffrench, the last Lord Ffrench, and the last pretender to the coronet, and took the Duchy for himself - the first new Duke of Aquila. As another gracious gesture to his new allies, the Rostays, Duke Vladmir also ordered all the Houses, save Anderon, to forgive their loans to that family, insisting a new time, and a new order had come. As the fortunes of most Aquilans, including the Bahlmis fortune, were tied up in Anderon banks, he could hardly have insisted House Anderon forgive the considerable debts of the Rostays.
The Rostays have since spent their meager incomes from their monopolies on maintaining the fiction that they are a significant political House, and on arranging all the right political marriages. Their country residence, untaxed, is expansive and cheerful, but their townhouse is in a miserable state of repair. In political conflicts, they tend to stay with the incumbent Duke, and always, when the dust has settled, the victor has either rewarded House Rostay, or ignored them utterly.
No matter their fortune, however, in political, or even financial matters, they are so vastly indebted, particularly considering the accumulated compound interest, that their poverty is almost laughable. They are only poor because they are surmounted by debts which they can never repay, and on which no one can ever hope to collect. All they retain are their homes, their title, and their honor.
The one other expense of the Rostays, of course, is the deep-seated feud with House Lagoran, which began in 2861, when then-Lord Lagoran confiscated lands clearly designated to House Rostay, though they had never begun to terraform there. Lagoran terraformed extensively, and by the time Rostay had cleared it with his legal advisors the land was his and he could take legal action, Lagoran was already well on the way to making the plot arable. War broke out between the two Houses, and was only partly settled in 2870.
When Duke Vladmir III, a Bahlmis, finally handed down his ruling in that year, it was incomplete. He had declared the lands belonged to Rostay, but had failed to indicate what should be done about the work that had been performed there, by the Lagorans. When Rostay attempted to march into the lands to reclaim them, Lagoran was there to meet him, insisting the land was forfeit until he was repaid for that work. Rostay was furious, and claimed that any work Lagoran had done was only just recompense for the losses House Rostay had endured in the battles between their Houses prior to the ruling.
Further edicts by the Duke were useless. Rostay and Lagoran continued to war, until at last the Ducal Army, headed by House Carlysle, was brought to bear, enforcing peace.
The peace has not been perfect, however. Countless times, over the centuries, a Lagoran or a Rostay has murdered one or a dozen of the other family, and more than twenty times outright war has broken out between them, and even in times of peace, the families have ever been at odds.
An oft-cited example of their feuding is the Battle of Ryndall Tower, in 3177. Then-Lord Lagoran, incited by some recent affliction caused by then-Lord Rostay, surrounded Rostay's brother, in Ryndall Tower, a small keep built by a younger Rostay son before the Ascension. Lord Lagoran demanded satisfaction, and swore he would destroy the Keep, which contained a Ducal heir, if his demands were not met.
The then Lord Rostay, Lord Jarvis, believing the Duke would not tolerate a threat leveled against his own kin, boldly refused to march his troops. Stupidly, as it turns out. Naturally, Lagoran merely sent the Ducal heir home, and unhindered set about leveling the Tower, killing everyone left inside. To this day, there are many a sad ballad sung in the halls of Rostay, to the lost lordling, and his kin, especially the House Anthem: "Tower of Tears."