The Sibylline Books

When the Etruscan Tarquinius Superbus refused to pay the price that [the sibyl] demanded for the nine volumes of her collected works, she burned three of them, then three more. Tarquin finally capitulated and had to pay the full original price for the three remaining books.
— Edward Tripp
Is there anything at all in those locked books?
If so, is it decipherable? And would he care for it?
He has no way of knowing. Her hand lies on that
mouldy stack, key hidden between two fingers.
Would she tell him one thing that's in them
— give him a clue? She shakes her head.
Naturally, he prevaricates over the vast price.
She takes three books, burns them in the courtyard.
Impossible to read her face, either, as she watches
each tome burst open, riffling its own pages.
(He strains to catch a glimpse.) Her eyes
hold diamond flames, scorched curling leaves.
Six books are left, the cost the same. Does he really
want them? All that hermetic stuff. Diagrams, no doubt.
And codes. (Each needing experts to unpick them!)
She's fuelling the fire again. He's panicking.
But what if she's a fraud? (That sum
would buy fifty horses!) Once more he descends
to glimpse parchment ashen as his face, then darkly
crumbling. Smoke slides down his throat, stops his voice.
Head tilted back, she listens to the crackling, the sighing…
He should never have cultivated antiquarian interests:
they're so fraught. He'd supposed they'd be restful!
Anyway, he's the King — he could have snapped
his fingers, commandeered those nine books.
But she makes him nervous. She has a certain air.
(Though who would've guessed she'd be into money?)
Well, curiosity demands he lose this war: he'll capitulate.
(Three for the original price — what a killer!)
Now she's going back to nowhere.
The gold is heavier than the books.
She'll plant it back in earth,
see what dreams it yields.