- Chewed. Nibbled. Tasted.” Ah, but were they tasty?

This strongly calls to mind the 'itchy tasty' scene in Resident Evil; the first game, I believe. If not the first, then certainly the second.

- He says that there are “no known animals” in northern Ichtar or “Ravensbund” that would attack or eat “a grown man in armour and defended with sword and spear.”

Who says they were eaten while they were still alive? Someone could have killed them, skedaddled, and then carnivores found them. Easy dinner, right there.

- “Ravensbundmen themselves”

What a clunky name. Couldn't they shorten it to 'Bundmen' or something, to make it less awkward?

- The narration tells us that occasionally, stories pass down “about man-eating icebears in the extreme north of Ravensbund.

I read 'icebears' as 'icebergs', and I was very confused for a few seconds.

- Gilbert further says that they are generally visible after they attack, because “[o]nce they have gorged”, they are “slimed with the blood of their victims.”

I have to give points for this; that's a pretty awesome visual. How terrifying would it be to find yourself hunted by something you can only see after it's killed your companions? I'm not going to use their official name to avoid Unfortunate Implications, but the wraiths are a hella cool concept.

- He says that the Ravensbund are afraid enough of them to leave (yes, I think we might have figured that out ourselves), and they “have never been afraid of anything before”, “savages as they are.”

I feel like this was stolen from George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. The wildlings who live in the far north are absolutely fearless, but they start to abandon their homes because...can you guess? They're terrified of white undead creatures that hunger for the blood and flesh of the living. They only appear at the very coldest of times, and their presence literally causes the temperature around them to plummet.

- Gilbert says they have, but the creatures are “somehow…insubstantial”, and they do not fear.

This too! The White Walkers are certainly corporeal, but they're invincible to everything except for fire and dragonglass (obsidian) weapons.

- However that works, as I am having trouble visualising this.

I would think of it like they're made of mist. Kind of like how water can get in through cracks and gaps in armor when it rains, so the wraiths can get in the same way. The gaps in armor are traditionally at the joints (elbows, knees, armpits, neck) so it doesn't impede movement too much. It should be easy for something without physical form to slip in through those places.

- A pity I cannot stand gore…

A Youtuber I follow who plays rather bloody games always jokes that it's not actual gore, it's just raspberry jelly, so Youtube shouldn't flag his videos as having violence in them.

- Jayme chuckles, saying it is not reliable, as Gilbert gives him bad dreams most nights, and “[he] is not yet ready to class [him] as one of the Forbidden.”

If we weren't supposed to hate Gilbert, this could actually be a funny line that displays the bond between the two of them, like two friends teasing each other.

- Gilbert suggests that they might have stolen the children from elsewhere.

Or, and here's a novel idea, maybe the children they're carrying are their own. If they're fleeing the north, it stands to reason that they would take their babies with them. The fact that they evade people rather than attack them just backs this up. They don't want trouble, they're just trying to escape.