It is valid to list files and provides of an uninstalled pkg. This broke
recently, likely with 4.14.1:

# rpm -q rpm
rpm-4.14.1-2.1.x86_64
Distribution: openSUSE Tumbleweed

# zypper -n in -ydD libfdt-devel
# rpm -qpliv --provides
/var/cache/zypp/packages/oss/suse/x86_64/libfdt-devel-1.4.4-1.5.x86_64.rpm
error: incorrect format: array iterator used with different sized arrays
-rw-r--r--    1 root    root                     4022 Jan 11 07:51
/usr/include/fdt.h
...
#  rpm -qpv --provides
/var/cache/zypp/packages/oss/suse/x86_64/libfdt-devel-1.4.4-1.5.x86_64.rpm
error: incorrect format: array iterator used with different sized arrays