Chapter 108: The First Harvests Are Sold Before They Grow

Harlan had spent most of his life worrying about whether crops would survive long enough to be harvested.

He had never expected to reach a point where people would begin arguing over who was allowed to buy crops that were still barely tall enough to cover a man’s ankle.

Yet that was exactly what greeted Raymond when he reached the Department of Agriculture one spring morning.

Three bakers, an innkeeper, two merchants, a brewer, and a livestock owner occupied the courtyard while Harlan stood between them with the expression of a man considering whether returning to ordinary farming would be less exhausting.

One merchant was waving a parchment. A baker insisted that he had spoken to the farmer first. The brewer wanted barley. The livestock owner wanted fodder.

Harlan spotted Raymond entering through the gate and immediately pointed at the crowd. "My Lord, they want to buy harvests that don’t exist yet."

Raymond stopped beside him. "That’s generally how future harvests work."

Harlan gave him a flat look before explaining the problem. Farmers working the newly cultivated land had begun receiving private offers for portions of their expected harvests. Bakers wanted guaranteed grain before prices changed.

Innkeepers wanted vegetables, eggs, meat, and brewing ingredients secured ahead of the growing season. Merchants had noticed that Althoff’s agricultural expansion might produce surpluses and wanted agreements before those surpluses reached the market.

Livestock owners needed dependable fodder supplies. Even craftsmen were appearing. Textile workers had begun asking whether farmers would plant flax, while sheep owners were already discussing future wool sales.

Harlan rubbed his forehead. "Yesterday a man walked into my building and asked me, ’Can I buy Farmer Deren’s harvest before it’s harvested?’ I told him I didn’t know. Then another man asked the same question about the same harvest."

That was where the problem became interesting. Until now, agriculture in Althoff had operated under emergency logic. During winter, Raymond had transformed the first fifteen hectares because people were starving.

Seeds, tools, labor, irrigation, storage, and distribution had been coordinated primarily by the government because failure meant famine.

Even after the additional hundred hectares and the enormous Tier IV expansion, the Department of Agriculture still controlled cultivation blocks, assigned seasonal rights, distributed available resources, and prioritized food security.

Nobody privately owned the upgraded farmland. Farmers were cultivators on government land, and much of their production had been planned around Althoff’s collective needs.

That arrangement had made sense during survival. It became increasingly awkward once farmers began producing for bakeries, inns, merchants, workshops, and other private buyers.

Raymond spent the morning walking through the agricultural zone with Harlan rather than solving the matter from behind a desk. Spring had changed the land almost beyond recognition.

Long strips of green grain covered fields where frozen, exhausted soil had once produced almost nothing. Vegetable plots followed irrigation routes.

Oxen moved steadily through areas still being prepared for later planting, while workers repaired channels, carried tools, and checked young crops.

Beyond the cultivated sections stretched hundreds of hectares of premium soil that remained unused because Althoff still lacked enough farmers, animals, seed, irrigation, and equipment to exploit everything at once. Raymond had once worried about obtaining enough fertile land. Now fertile land was waiting for people.

They stopped beside a grain field assigned to a farmer named Deren, the unfortunate man whose future harvest had already attracted competing buyers.

Deren admitted that he wanted to accept the baker’s offer because guaranteed payment would let him purchase another ox with his brother and improve his household before harvest.

The merchant, however, had offered more money for the same grain. Deren had not signed either agreement because he was unsure whether he possessed the legal right to sell crops grown on government land.

Harlan added another concern: nobody knew exactly how much Deren would harvest. Disease, weather, pests, labor shortages, or simple bad luck could reduce production. Raymond immediately rejected any arrangement that treated an estimate as guaranteed physical grain regardless of circumstances.

The answer did not need to become complicated. Farmers holding recognized cultivation rights could make agreements concerning their expected produce, provided those agreements were registered through the Department of Agriculture.

The Department would record the farmer, cultivation block, crop, estimated area, buyer, contracted quantity or proportion, agreed price terms, and expected harvest period.

Farmers could not contract more produce than reasonable estimates supported. More importantly, once part of a harvest had been promised, that commitment entered the record.

Deren could not sell the same hundred sacks of grain to a baker, then promise those identical hundred sacks to a merchant and disappear when harvest arrived.

Buyers would also be prevented from using deliberately abusive terms against farmers who could not read complicated contracts.

Raymond was equally determined not to make the Department responsible for every bad bargain.

If a farmer legally agreed to sell grain at a certain price and market prices later rose, the government would not cancel the agreement merely because the farmer regretted it.

Likewise, if prices fell, the buyer could not suddenly decide the contract had become inconvenient.

The Department’s purpose was to record agreements, verify that sellers held legitimate cultivation rights, prevent obvious fraud, and establish basic protections. It was not going to negotiate everyone’s business for them.

Harlan listened carefully before nodding. "So we’re making sure the promise exists and that the person making it actually has something he is allowed to promise."

Raymond smiled. "Exactly. Preferably without creating three buildings full of clerks to accomplish it."

Word traveled faster than Raymond expected. By afternoon, people were already arriving at Agriculture with proposed agreements. A bakery sought a fixed portion of wheat from three farmers.

An innkeeper negotiated future deliveries of onions, beans, eggs, and vegetables from several households rather than relying entirely on daily market prices. A brewer discussed barley with farmers considering their next planting cycle.

A livestock owner arranged fodder purchases from a block specifically designated for feed production. Two merchants wanted rights to purchase surplus grain after local food requirements and existing contracts were satisfied.

Harlan refused anyone attempting to claim an entire farmer’s output without leaving reasonable flexibility, especially while the system was new.

The textile requests created another conversation. Althoff currently prioritized food, and Raymond had no intention of sacrificing grain security because someone wanted fashionable linen.

But the agricultural expansion meant specialty crops could gradually become viable. Flax could support textile production. Oil crops could reduce dependence on imported oils. Herbs could supply healers and merchants. Brewing grains had obvious demand.

Orchards would take years but could become valuable later. Wool production linked agriculture to livestock and textile craftsmen.

The important change was that farmers were beginning to ask what people wanted to buy rather than merely what the government told them to plant. Demand was becoming another force shaping the fields.

That realization brought Raymond back to the unresolved question beneath everything: land. Seasonal cultivation rights had been useful while Althoff expanded rapidly and needed flexibility, but they gave farmers little certainty beyond the current planting cycle.

Why would a family invest years improving drainage, constructing a barn, planting fruit trees, breeding livestock, or developing a particular farm if the government could theoretically assign them a different block next season?

Raymond did not want to sell the upgraded farmland outright, especially before Althoff understood its future land values. Permanent sale could come later under proper inheritance, consolidation, abandonment, and ownership rules. Leasing offered a middle ground.

A farmer could receive a multi-year lease over a defined agricultural holding while the land itself remained property of Althoff.

That farmer would gain enough security to invest in improvements, plan future crops, enter longer agreements, and potentially pass approved lease rights within a household under rules yet to be designed.

In exchange, the territory could collect rent and impose conditions against abandonment or destructive use. Raymond discussed the idea with Harlan as they walked between fields, but deliberately stopped short of establishing the system immediately.

They still needed Alaric, Ysabel, Agriculture, Treasury, Survey, and Civil Registry to determine how plots would be measured, valued, transferred, inherited, renewed, and reclaimed.

"Seasonal rights remain for now," Raymond decided. "We design leases properly before anyone signs one."

Harlan seemed relieved. He had survived famine, miraculous soil, impossible harvests, refugee farmers, and more land than he knew what to do with.

Raymond suspected announcing an entirely new land tenure system before supper might finally break him. Still, the direction was obvious.

Agriculture could no longer remain a permanent emergency program managed from planting to consumption by the government. Farmers needed room to become producers with their own interests, customers, investments, and plans.

Near sunset, Raymond returned to the Department courtyard. The morning’s shouting had disappeared. A clerk sat behind a table with a fresh registry while Harlan supervised the first agreements.

Deren stood beside the baker who had approached him earlier. Their contract covered only part of Deren’s expected grain harvest, leaving the remainder uncommitted. Another farmer registered an agreement to supply vegetables to an inn.

A livestock owner secured future fodder. The brewer was still negotiating and complaining about barley prices, which Raymond considered proof that commerce was functioning normally.

The clerk entered the final details, checked Deren’s cultivation block against Department records, and stamped the agreement.

Then another contract was placed before him.

And another.

Outside, green fields stretched toward the horizon, most still months away from harvest. Yet portions of what they would produce were already being bought, sold, planned, financed, and connected to businesses throughout Althoff.

For the first time, the fields were producing commerce before they produced food.

Agriculture was becoming an industry.