He watched her strip the pulp from the centre of the reeds with the concave side of a teaspoon, sharpened at the rim with a whetstone. She split each one open down the middle by hand and ran the spoon from end to end, the insides of the plant bunching up like viennetta before falling to one side or the other, and then into the long grass.

“Isn’t that a waste?”

“Not worth keeping. No nutritional value. Dry as hell but can’t even burn it.” She looked up only very briefly after finishing one reed and picking up the next. “Besides, the skitterbugs love it. And when the skitterbugs come, the honeyrats come, and when the honeyrats come the rainowls come and gobble them up. And I’d sooner have happy rainowls out here than skitterbugs in my syrup, honeyrats under the floorboards, and an angry, hungry rainowl tapping at my window in the middle of the night.” She finished another and set it down, and looked at him. “Wouldn’t you?”