Whatever secrets Lia uncovered led to her death -- and now the bad guys are after D'Eon because he is determined (and compelled by her tortured soul) to uncover the truth behind her demise. And the same bad guys are killing people and turning them into 'gargoyles' -- gargoyles in this show are sort've like zombies with mercury for blood. Very cool monsters.   

Besides D'Eon, the main good guys are the young page Robin, the mysterious Durand, and the swordsman Teillagory.

Robin gets points for not being annoying and significantly more for actually being cool. He is bossy, bold, and very politically savvy. And he makes it clear in several scenes that he does not consider himself a child. I like Robin; it's very seldom that I say this about 'child sidekick' characters in anime.

Durand is cool, collected, and ruthless and gets some of the best lines -- he's wonderfully snarky.

Teillagory trained D'Eon and Lia to fence; he's loyal and was asked to help by D'eon. Of all the characters, he is perhaps the most clichéd -- he's the wise old teacher respected by the young hero. We've seen him before in a thousand previous incarnations in a thousand previous series.

As far as actual storytelling -- the pacing and the plotting -- this show  isn't bad at all. There are some sections that feel disjointed, as if scenes were cut or left out. In a few instances I was left going, "Huh?" -- but overall, it's not nearly a big enough issue to warrant warning viewers away.

I suspect the 'disjointedness' will be less of a problem in future episodes and was, really, a minor problem. I've seen some very successful series start out with similar issues in early episodes ... I'm going to give it a chance and will certainly pick up future DVDs of this one.

One final note -- the historical commentary on this show is worth listening to because it covers some interesting details about the time that not all watchers may know. However, the production commentary with David Matranga and Steven Foster deserves a definite warning for bad language.

In summary -- this is a DVD I strongly recommend for history buffs and for fans who like a 'serious' style anime. It's a very promising new series worth watching.