Agrippa had a sly smile as he replied to the first Centurion. “I’ll follow your advice, and thank you. Soldiers are a funny lot you know. To live a life in the legions as men, yet they can have such petty jealousies like little girls. I ask you now, who do you respect more? The hairless young man who is brave at heart and follows his commanders orders, or a bunch of grizzly old men that turn green with avarice and cry in their pillows because Caesar loves another?”

The Centurion gave a chuckle. He liked the lad well enough, but all the same, for his own reputation he planned to not be too overly social.

“That’s the real heart of it isn’t it? We all want to be Caesar’s boys don’t we?” Agrippa continued. “Caesar loves any man willing to get his hands dirty for the good of Rome. Some of us just want his favor more than others and some us work more for it than others. I’ll be hairy and grizzly in my own time Petraius. In the meanwhile, I’m not too concerned with slurs about being pretty. I won’t antagonize the issue, but my sword can certainly settle a dispute. And for those that really want to make me out to be Caesar’s pet, they had better be careful not to let word get back to the “Queen of Bithynia” himself or they will most certainly lose their heads!”

How could one seem so prudent yet reckless at the same time, The Centurion thought to himself. The boy seemed talented, but did that lead to his cockiness or rightful self-assurance. All the same, he understood the comment about the Queen of Bithynia. A sexual slur directed at Caesar and used by his enemies in the old days. Anyone calling into the question the great man’s sexual orientation by way of insulting Agrippa certainly would have hell to pay.