I used the word mutter just because Gabino is speaking in a low voice (he's standing right over Eskiera, and is rather tired himself). I could've used 'whisper' but that would imply he's hiding something, which is not the case. The word 'sigh' would've worked, but I already used it in another part of the text.
The humans know the elf as 'Shrike', although they suspect it's a fake name. Shrike may or may not conform to (human) gender norms, but mostly it's just another aspect of their identity the humans are not aware of. So they refer to Shrike with singular they pronouns for lack of another option.
I'll look into the paragraphs! This is my forst time writing in this format.

Thanks! But that wasn't necessarily what I had in mind when I wrote that line. What I wanted to convey was that, firstly, Eskiera's magic is subtle and protective in nature, and secondly, that the battle was chaotic (without going in to too much detail). The phrase was just a way to connect those two. In general, I tend to move away from the "Order=Good, Chaos=Evil" thing, it's a bit limiting. In some ways the story is about that: the outcasts are good even though they're labelled chaotic by society. The Tyrants are bad even though they exemplify order. Now, I could say the line about Eskiera's magic was a deliberate point about how Order/Chaos is a false dichotomy or whatever, but I wasn't really thinking about it when I wrote it!