The Quartered Sea by Tanya Huff

From the publisher (source: The Internet Book List):
No one could deny that the young bard Benedict was the most powerful Singer of water in the entire kingdom of Shkoder. But water was the only Quarter he could Sing. And without the ability to Sing air, he was isolated from his fellow bards in a way few among them could even begin to understand. So when Queen Jelena asked for a bard to volunteer for a dangerous mission - to take the newly build Starfarer and search beyond the known lands on a quest to find the homeland of the legendary Dark Sailor, Benedikt immediately volunteered. After all, he had more to prove than any other bard, and with Bardic Captain Kover adamantly against the queen's proposed expedition, Benedikt was the only one rebellious enough to go.

The trip went smoothly enough until Starfarer was deep into uncharted waters. It was then that disaster struck, leaving Benedikt stranded with no way to get a message back to Shkoder, no way to let anyone know what had happened, no way to tell anyone that he was still alive.

Washed up on the shores of a distant land, Benedikt was soon claimed by his rescuers as a pawn in their intricate and perilous game of politics and religion. Could this One Quarter bard find a Song that would let him survive without disturbing the precarious power balance of a civilization he barely understood?

This book is part of the "Quarters" series.
Here are some other books from this series: