The sun bathes the fields in a golden hue, the wind is slight and the air is warm yet tinted with the smell of death.  Elysium stands before me in all of its majesty as I stare at its awe inspiring beauty I know what this means for me.  I can still hear the din of battle behind me, but it seems so distant.  I turn my head for one more look at the mortal world and all I see is the darkness of war and sorrow.  My look lasts no longer than a few brief moments as I realize that I am finally free.  I no longer need the sword that has been an extension of my arm for these past ten years, the only regret I carry with me is that this battle was not won before I met my demise.  I spent my entire adult life enslaved in the King’s army with one of two choices fight and survive or die with shackles on my legs.  For ten years I fought along side thousands of others imprisoned just like me fighting and dying for another man’s glory.  We fought hard and we fought well, not for our capture but for each other and for our sanity.  My father once said even when a man has nothing he will find something to live for.  My comrades and I chose to live for each other, hacking and slashing our way across a foreign land for a foreign king not for glory or riches but for friendship and camaraderie.  Those men were my family, the closest thing that a sewer rat like me had to kin and I gladly waded into battle along side of them.  Now here I stand at the edge of the Elysian Fields ready to walk into the afterlife pleased with the thought that I fought well enough to gain entrance to paradise but saddened by the thought that I let my comrades down.  The sweet smell of lilacs and the slight sound of maidens giggling from within the fields pushed away my regrets as I plunged into the golden wheat.  The sounds of the world had all but faded as I walked further into eternity.  A smile broke across my face as I came upon a large table lined with the many friends who had fallen in battle before me.  They raised their overflowing mugs high in the air as they bellowed a mighty salute.  I was quickly surrounded by my comrades and given a heavy mug of frothy ale.  “The cup is endless, the women willing, and your comrades full of story and song.”  One of them said as I swallowed a cold gulp of liquid gold, ten years of enslavement and a life time of misery and sorrow were well worth what I found in the golden fields of Elysium……PEACE!!!!!!!