diff --git a/src/hb-serialize.hh b/src/hb-serialize.hh
index d6aa58405..2f23b5853 100644
--- a/src/hb-serialize.hh
+++ b/src/hb-serialize.hh
@@ -547,6 +547,8 @@ struct hb_serialize_context_t
     unsigned int len = (this->head - this->start)
 		     + (this->end  - this->tail);
 
+    if (!len) return hb_bytes_t ();
+
     char *p = (char *) malloc (len);
     if (unlikely (!p)) return hb_bytes_t ();
 
diff --git a/test/fuzzing/fonts/clusterfuzz-testcase-minimized-hb-subset-fuzzer-5269686781607936 b/test/fuzzing/fonts/clusterfuzz-testcase-minimized-hb-subset-fuzzer-5269686781607936
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..5c0ad795f
Binary files /dev/null and b/test/fuzzing/fonts/clusterfuzz-testcase-minimized-hb-subset-fuzzer-5269686781607936 differ